Question: any reason to check that new entry timestamp is newer than previous?

[valkuc]

Hi.
I'm referring to this line https://github.com/armink/FlashDB/blob/a208b1555b9805c4fb13336b0c1529d2df8d5641/src/fdb_tsdb.c#L398C6-L398C6

Any reason to perform this check? What bad can happen if user will be allowed to save TSDB entries with "out-of-order" timestamp?

I'm just thinking about situation when having this check can break TSDB data appending. Example:

1. Time: 01-01-2023 - add new entry - OK
2. Time: 02-01-2023 - add new entry - OK
3. Time: 03-03-2023 (user mistakenly changed the date in the system) - add new entry - FAIL
4. Time: 03-01-2023 (user fixed the date in the system) - add new entry - FAIL
5. and it will always fail until event date will be after 03-03-2023

UPD:
I'm actually faced such situations while developing firmware, but in my case (time_t is int64) I got a saved event somewhere in the year 32012 :-)

[armink]

Because the FlashDB uses the binary search algorithm to search TSDB. The search will cause problems when timestamp cannot keep incrementing.

[valkuc]

If the binary search is used just for iteration functions then what about make this feature less restrictive? I see few options:

1. Allow to save such values and print warning message like "The saved timestamp is before the last saved entry - the search functions may work incorrectly"
2. Add configuration option (#define) to disable timestamp check. This option should be well commented, with information that enabling this option can break up searching functionality if newly saved item timestamp is lesser than previous, use it at your own risk.

[armink]

If you know it's wrong, why do you do it?

[valkuc]

Well, this will work if it's necessary just to display last 100 saved records. Also this will prevent situations like I described in my first message - when the date was changed to the future and then changed back. Because there is no functionality to delete specific TSDB record it can lead to a deadlock - you will not be able to save anything until you either clean whole partition or wait until your actual date will be greater than last saved.