AttributeError: 'Sections' object has no attribute 'changelog'

[xsuchy]

Description

When Specfile does not have changelog section and you try to read it you get:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/home/msuchy/projects/license-validate/./print-spec-changelog.py", line 10, in <module>
    print(sections.changelog)
          ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/home/msuchy/.local/lib/python3.12/site-packages/specfile/sections.py", line 180, in __getattr__
    return super().__getattribute__(id)
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
AttributeError: 'Sections' object has no attribute 'changelog'

The script is

#!/usr/bin/python3
from specfile import Specfile
import sys

# this is dump, but do the work
filename = sys.argv[1]
specfile = Specfile(filename, force_parse=True)

with specfile.sections() as sections:
    print(sections.changelog)

While the TB is technically correct, I would argue that the getter should return empty section to make the user experience better.

Benefit

No response

Importance

No response

Workaround

• There is an existing workaround that can be used until this feature is implemented.

Participation

• I am willing to submit a pull request for this issue. (Packit team is happy to help!)

[nforro]

I think the library should be able to express the difference between a spec file without a %changelog and a spec file with an empty %changelog. While it could be possible to "decouple" "changelog" in sections from sections.changelog, I'm not sure it's the best idea. Also, if sections.changelog returned an empty section, it would technically be creating a new section in the spec file, which should be a conscious action.

[nforro]

How about something like this, to make the creation explicit:

with spec.sections() as sections:
    changelog = sections.get_or_create("changelog")
    changelog[:] = ["%autochangelog"]

which would be equivalent to this:

with spec.sections() as sections:
    try:
        sections.changelog[:] = ["%autochangelog"]
    except AttributeError:
        sections.append(Section("changelog", data=["%autochangelog"]))

[xsuchy]

I like it.