Bug #23345
open
API tests fail on Debian 13 because timestamps include a UTC offset
Description
Steps to reproduce: debootstrap Debian 13 into a systemd-nspawn VM, run install-dev-tools.yml on it, run tests.
See attached test log. Given how this got discovered, I'm going to guess this is a new feature in PostgreSQL, or a new way Debian configures PostgreSQL, or something adjacent.
Of course other test suites fail for basically the same reason.
Files
Updated by Brett Smith 4 months ago
- Blocks Idea #23170: Add support for Debian 13 (trixie) added
Updated by Brett Smith 3 months ago
- Target version set to Development 2026-01-06
- Assigned To set to Brett Smith
Updated by Tom Clegg 3 months ago
- Related to Bug #16349: [API] Timestamp comparisons are incorrect when database session uses a non-UTC time zone added
Updated by Brett Smith 3 months ago
My VM started passing after I installed the tzdata-legacy package. My guess about what happened is:
- my host system is using a deprecated timezone name
- that gets pulled into the VM configuration
- that got pulled into the PostgreSQL configuration
- When there wasn't any data for the timezone in configuration, PostgreSQL returned offsets instead.
The good news is that means there's ~nothing to do here: in a properly clean install (without step 2), this issue wouldn't even come up.
Updated by Brett Smith 3 months ago
Theory basically confirmed: my host was US/Eastern, I made it America/New_York. Then I removed tzdata-legacy from the VM, rebooted, and tests still pass.
There's maybe work we could do to make RailsAPI more reliable here. But at the same time, there are lots of ways you could break Arvados by writing bad PostgreSQL server configuration. In general I don't feel like it's a good use of our time to defend against unlikely cases. At the very least, Debian 13 is no worse than any other distribution we support in this regard, so there's no reason to hold up trixie support on it.
Updated by Brett Smith 3 months ago
We want RailsAPI startup to detect this situation and abort if it happens. Will rewrite the ticket description to become that.
We should also include an upgrade note about this when we announce Debian 13 support since it is sort of a known issue with the upgrade.
Updated by Brett Smith 3 months ago
- Target version deleted (
Development 2026-01-06)