ikiwiki/doc/bugs/pagemtime_in_refresh_mode.mdwn

I'd like a way to always ask the RCS (Git) to update a file's mtime in
refresh mode.  This is currently only done on the first build, and later
for `--gettime --rebuild`.  But always rebuilding is too heavy-weight for
this use-case.  My options are to either manually set the mtime before
refreshing, or to have ikiwiki do it at command.  I used to do the
former, but would now like the latter, as ikiwiki now generally does this
timestamp handling.

From a quick look, the code in `IkiWiki/Render.pm:find_new_files` is
relevant: `if (! $pagemtime{$page}) { [...]`.

How would you like to tackle this?

--[[tschwinge]]

> This could be done via a `needsbuild` hook. The hook is passed 
> the list of changed files, and it should be safe to call `rcs_getmtime`
> and update the `pagemtime` for each.
> 
> That lets the feature be done by a plugin, which seems good, since
> `rcs_getmtime` varies between very slow and not very fast, depending on 
> VCS.
> 
> AFAICS, the only use case for doing this is if you commit changes and
> then delay pushing them to a DVCS repo. Since then the file mtime will
> be when the change was pushed, not when it was committed. But I've
> generally felt that recording when a change was published to the repo
> of a wiki as its mtime is good enough. --[[Joey]]