View's VersionLog uses wrong timestamp if ViewVersions are reused #12809

Apache Iceberg version

1.8.1 (latest release)

Query engine

Spark

Please describe the bug 🐞

Lets assume the following changes:

1. ViewVersion 1 is added and set active
2. View Version 2 is added and set active
3. View Version 1 is set active.

This resulted in the following version_log:

    "version-log": [
        {
            "version-id": 1,
            "timestamp-ms": 1744716416168
        },
        {
            "version-id": 2,
            "timestamp-ms": 1744716449754
        },
        {
            "version-id": 1,
            "timestamp-ms": 1744716416168
        }
    ],

Note that the last and first entries have the same timestamp, namely the timestamp of the initial ViewVersion creation.

I believe this is undesired in a history, where we are interested when a certain change became active. It makes sense to use the exact timestamp of the ViewVersion if it was added in the same set of changes, but re-enabling a previously used view version (maybe years ago) should not add a history for this past timestamp.

Fix in Rust: apache/iceberg-rust#1218

The problematic line in Java is here:

Willingness to contribute

• I can contribute a fix for this bug independently
• I would be willing to contribute a fix for this bug with guidance from the Iceberg community
• I cannot contribute a fix for this bug at this time