Re: Time Issues.

[Bengt Thuree <bengt thuree com>]

Hi Pat,

Since F-Spot do change the time in EXIF to a UTC (based on the computer)
time, and do not handle timezone's yet there will always be a problem
with time's in F-Spot. 

I can see two solutions, 
1) Do not manipulate the time in EXIF at all, at least then we know what
we have :) No matter from which camera we import the photos.
2) Add a timezone field to each photo. This solution is the best, but
currently mono is not handling timezone's. (will handle it not to far
into the future though).

Currently I think we have to wait for the timezone update to be readily
available in mono, as well as the Import function to be
re-designed/re-factored.

There are still about 4-5 bugs in bugzilla related to the time issues. 

/Bengt

On Sun, 2007-11-18 at 19:22 -0500, Pat Suwalski wrote:
> Hello list,
> 
> I would like some clarification on a very serious issue regarding time
> in f-spot. I've searched the archives and came across several time when
> this was brought up, but I have a specific twist on it. I'm using 0.4.0 
> in Ubuntu, I don't think it's patched in any way.
> 
> The problem is that (I think) f-spot likes to change the time tags
> whenever it imports a photo. "Image Created" seems to be set to the
> current import time, "Image Generated" moved up a few hours (UTC?), and 
> "Image Digitized" stays original, I think.
> 
> My case involves a photos that have been imported three times. The first
> time was simply to get them off my camera and onto my laptop. The second
> time, the directory on my laptop was copied to my desktop and imported.
> Then, I installed Ubuntu, f-spot wasn't happy with its older data file,
> so I wiped it and imported all my photos again.
> 
> At this point, the times on all of my photos are completely out of whack.
> 
> To demonstrate; Here is a photo that has gone through one proper import,
> and then was used as a source for import in my desktop computer:
> 
> Image Created: 2007:10:27 01:47:45
> Image Generated: 2007:08:16 16:52:33
> Image Digitized: 2007:08:16 12:52:33
> 
> The time 12:52 should be the correct time. After a consecutive import:
> 
> Image Created: 2007:11:11 00:47:49
> Image Generated: 2007:08:17 00:52:33
> Image Digitized: 2007:08:16 12:52:33
> 
> I see that the "Image Created" date was changed to the date at import.
> Less correctly. the "Image Generated" tag has changed again! It's now a
> whole 180° out of phase with the time it was actually taken.
> 
> Furthermore, it means that at import, if in the EST time zone, and I 
> take a photo after 8pm, it gets imported into a date folder that is a 
> day ahead.
> 
> I know that I can use the time tool in f-spot to set the time right, but 
> why are the times even changed? I read it has something to do with 
> ordering and multiple sources, but doing so blindly seems downright 
> wrong. f-spot should only modify the photo files in any way upon user 
> consent. I had no idea that a simple action like importing my photos 
> from the camera would alter the time stamps.
> 
> Is this all accurate, or am I actually doing something wrong? At the 
> moment it looks like I have many hours of manual cleanup labour ahead of 
> me. I would like to prevent this in the future.
> 
> Thanks!
> --Pat
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