Re: [PATCH] bitbake-layers: layerindex-fetch: respect --branch for already-configured layers

[Paul Barker <paul@pbarker.dev>]

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On Sat, 2025-11-01 at 15:56 +0200, Osama Abdelkader wrote:
> [YOCTO #7852]
> 
> The layerindex-fetch command has two issues when --branch is specified:
> 
> 1. If a layer is already in bblayers.conf, the command exits early with
>    "You already have the requested layer(s)" without checking if the
>    layer is on the requested branch.
> 
> 2. For layers in bblayers.conf (cooker layers), the branch checking code
>    added in commit 138dd7883ee (2022) never executes because cooker layers
>    are skipped entirely in the fetch loop.
> 
> This patch fixes both issues by:
> 
> - Preventing the early exit (fast path) when --branch is specified, forcing
>   branch verification even for already-configured layers.
> 
> - Adding branch check/switch logic for cooker layers when --branch is
>   specified. The code finds each layer's git repository and calls
>   get_fetch_layer() with the requested branch to perform the validation
>   and checkout if needed.
> 
> - Fixing the branch detection in get_fetch_layer() to use
>   'git rev-parse --abbrev-ref HEAD' instead of parsing 'git branch' output.
> 
> - Fixing undefined 'stderr' variable (should be 'completed_proc.stderr').
> 
> This completes the fix started in commit 138dd7883ee, allowing users to
> use --branch to switch already-configured layers to different branches.
> 
> Signed-off-by: Osama Abdelkader <osama.abdelkader@gmail.com>

Hi,

Thanks for the contribution! Apologies for the delay in reviewing it, we've
been focused on finishing the 5.3 release.

This looks like a useful change but it's difficult to review in its current
form. Could you split this into multiple commits? Based on the above detail
there are 4 different logical changes here so we would prefer each of those as
a separate patch.

I'd especially like the completed_proc.stderr fix to be isolated as it
may need to be backported to a stable release. So this fix should come
first in the series - best practice is to put patches that fix bugs
first, then patches that add features.

I think you'll also need to apply these changes to the bitbake
repository rather than the poky repository to remove the unnecessary
'bitbake/' prefix on the file paths.

Best regards,

-- 
Paul Barker

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