diff --git a/cmake/modules/AppUtilities.cmake b/cmake/modules/AppUtilities.cmake
index b1ac058..4b0a90e 100644
--- a/cmake/modules/AppUtilities.cmake
+++ b/cmake/modules/AppUtilities.cmake
@@ -63,20 +63,10 @@ function (add_appstream_file)
         string(REGEX REPLACE "\n([^$])" "\n  \\1" META_APP_APPDATA_BODY "${META_APP_APPDATA_BODY}")
     endif ()
 
-    # make the day of the last modification the release date
-    set(META_RELEASE_DATE_${META_PROJECT_VARNAME_UPPER} "" CACHE STRING "release date of ${META_PROJECT_NAME}")
-    if (META_RELEASE_DATE_${META_PROJECT_VARNAME_UPPER} STREQUAL "")
-        execute_process(
-            COMMAND
-            sh -c "date --iso-8601 --reference=\"$(find . -type f -not -path '*.git/*' -printf '%T@ %P\n' | sort -n | awk '{print $2}' | tail -n1)\""
-            WORKING_DIRECTORY
-            "${CMAKE_SOURCE_DIR}"
-            OUTPUT_VARIABLE META_RELEASE_DATE
-        )
-        string(STRIP "${META_RELEASE_DATE}" META_RELEASE_DATE)
-        set(META_RELEASE_DATE_${META_PROJECT_VARNAME_UPPER} "${META_RELEASE_DATE}" CACHE STRING "release date of ${META_PROJECT_NAME}" FORCE)
-    else ()
-        set(META_RELEASE_DATE "${META_RELEASE_DATE_${META_PROJECT_VARNAME_UPPER}}")
+    # skip if not all required meta-data is present
+    if (NOT META_RELEASE_DATE)
+        message(STATUS "The variable META_RELEASE_DATE is not set. Not creating an AppStream file.")
+        return ()
     endif ()
 
     # create appstream desktop file from template