What does "dirty" mean?

[uilianries]

This question came from Slack. An user asked there which situation could result in a "dirty build directory" and why it should be removed.

We don't have a formal explanation about .dirty on Docs, because it's more like an internal stuff to avoid poisoned cache. But since the user is able to read an warning about "your build folder is dirty and will be removed", I think we could add some section explaining why we considered that folder as "dirty".

[memsharded]

the explanation is an unfinished things. If build directory is dirty is because the build failed, and the folder was not removed (Conan might try to remove folders automatically to keep cache clean from corrupted artifacts)

[uilianries]

I would include some note about --keep-xxx and if it affects the dirty behavior :)

[danimtb]

If it is a minor question, add it to the FAQ as usual

[earonesty]

Today, every package we installed comes down as "dirty", not sure why. I think it's a server/vs/client version thing,.

[memsharded]

Hi @earonesty

Can you elaborate a bit more? Can you post some output of that, and clarify which Conan version? After an upgrade of the client, or the server? Is it happening with a clean install, downloading fresh packages from the server?. dirty flags should be occasional, if you are seeing many of them, it might be an issue. Thanks!