[rdiff-backup-users] changed file format?

[S . Isard]

Sorry if this is covered in the documentation or the list archives.
I've searched, but maybe not known what to look for.

I am converting from version 0.12.3 to 0.12.6, both versions built with
the same copy of librsync-0.9.6, on a RH9 machine with kernel 2.4.20.
It appears that rdiff-backup file formats are not entirely compatible
between the two versions.  I have done the following test:

Saved a directory with the old version
rdiff-backup.0.12.3 tmp test

Listed it with the new version
rdiff-backup.0.12.6 --list-at-time T test
(where T comes from the data files in test/rdiff-backup-data)
This works fine.

Re-saved the same directory with the new version
rdiff-backup.0.12.6 tmp test
Got a warning message:
Warning: Metadata file not found.
Metadata will be read from filesystem.

Retried the list command above with same time T, i.e., the time at which
the data was backed up using 0.12.3
rdiff-backup.0.12.6 --list-at-time T test
Failure with error message:
Fatal Error: Mirror metadata not found
Traceback ending with
rdiff_backup.connection.ConnectionReadError: Truncated header string
(problem probably originated remotely)

Does this mean that if I start using 0.12.6 for my daily backups, I will
lose access to all of my old data?  Anything to be done apart from
starting over with a full backup under the new version and keeping a
copy of the old one around for getting at the existing files?

I noticed that the time format in the filenames has changed.  The files
created by the old version end with "+01:00" for my timezone, but the
new version uses "Z" (except for the error log, which still has
"+01:00").

Thanks in advance.

Stephen Isard