Re: Timestamp/manifest problems caused by Antivirus

On 28 May 2016 at 12:18, Bastian Eicher <[email protected]> wrote:
> Hello all,
>
> a recent error report of a Zero Install for Windows user made me aware of an
> interesting issue: Some Windows Antivirus tools seem to modify the "last
> modified" timestamps of executables they scan. This then causes generated
> manifest digests to mismatch the expected values listed in feeds.
>
> In my opinion, this kind of behavior is a bug in the Antivirus tool since it
> should not "touch" a file it is only scanning. However, it does lead me to
> wonder whether a new manifest format that does not include timestamps might
> be useful, at least for applications that are not affected by them. After
> all, tools like "make" that make decisions based on comparing the age of two
> files are more of an exception than the rule, at least in the Windows world.
>
> What do you guys think?

Does sound like a scanner bug. Could we set the file as read-only to
prevent it updating it?


-- 
Dr Thomas Leonard        http://roscidus.com/blog/
GPG: DA98 25AE CAD0 8975 7CDA  BD8E 0713 3F96 CA74 D8BA

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