On Mon, 2026-03-16 at 10:24 +0100, Rasmus Villemoes via lists.openembedded.org wrote: > On Fri, Jan 16 2026, "Rasmus Villemoes via lists.openembedded.org" > <[email protected]> wrote: > > > Hi > > > > When some task uses mktemp(1) or similar functionality (e.g. the > > python tempfile module) to create a temporary file or dir, those end up > > being created in the global /tmp directory. That's obviously not ideal, > > as those might be left behind in case of an unclean shutdown or if the > > script is not properly written, and won't be cleaned by do_clean or > > RM_WORK. Also, /tmp is often a tmpfs instance, while some tasks might > > want to create rather large temporary files. > > > > Most such utilities/interfaces respect the TMPDIR environment variable, > > if set. However, since that name is used by bitbake for a rather central > > concept, one cannot simply 'export TMPDIR', as one doesn't want that > > top-level build dir polluted by random build files, and it still > > wouldn't be removed by do_clean or RM_WORK. Ideally, all tasks would > > have a TMPDIR _environment_ variable set to something below ${WORKDIR}, > > maybe even something unique per task (say ${T}/${taskname}.d). But > > there's no simple way to do that that doesn't conflict with bitbake's > > use of the TMPDIR name. > > > > Can we do anything about this? > > > > (1) Do nothing, live with this limitation. > > > > (2) Special-case TMPDIR, so that all tasks are created with a proper > > value of TMPDIR in the environment, not derived from the bitbake > > variable of the same name. Could be settable with some new TASK_TMPDIR > > or do_foo[tmpdir] flag. Somewhat hacky, though. > > > > (3) Bite the bullet and plan for renaming TMPDIR -> BBTMPDIR, so that > > the TMPDIR name becomes available for use with its standard POSIX > > meaning. Obviously a huge thing to do, but hopefully most direct TMPDIR > > references are in core or bitbake and used for deriving other standard > > variables. > > I tried doing TMPDIR -> BB_TMPDIR in bitbake and most places in core > (there are some places which use TMPDIR in the posix sense), and it > seems to build a core-image-minimal without problems. > > So it's not impossible, and one could prepare for the transition by > eliminating quite a few direct TMPDIR references using already existing > or new derived variables (e.g. BASE_SHAREDWORKDIR = > ${TMPDIR}/work-shared), making the number of places that would need > the rename rather small. > > I'd be happy to send such preparatory patches, but it would be pointless > if the community doesn't deem this to be a problem worth fixing.
Hi Rasmus, I think it's worth trying to disambiguate between the two uses of TMPDIR if we can, but it's not a change we can take this close to the next LTS release. I recommend sending an RFC patch for people to ealuate, after the 6.0 "wrynose" release. Thanks, -- Paul Barker
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