From 76a4ff0a61284ee23c17337c903e50a7b75ca66b Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Ray <13111236+RaysDev@users.noreply.github.com>
Date: Wed, 18 Mar 2020 00:06:09 -0400
Subject: [PATCH] fix small data dependent bug

---
 picard/metadata.py | 2 +-
 1 file changed, 1 insertion(+), 1 deletion(-)

diff --git a/picard/metadata.py b/picard/metadata.py
index 49bf3f376..1c3a59d9f 100644
--- a/picard/metadata.py
+++ b/picard/metadata.py
@@ -255,7 +255,7 @@ class Metadata(MutableMapping):
         # release has a no date (all else equal, we don't prefer this release since its date is missing)
         # release has a date but it does not match ours(all else equal, its better to have an unknown date than a wrong date. since the unknown could actually be correct)
         factor = 0.0
-        if "date" in release:
+        if "date" in release and release['date'] != '':
             release_date = release['date']
             release_year = extract_year_from_date(release_date)
             if "date" in self: