Question about commit message conventions

Question about commit message conventions

[Tobias Toedter]

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Hi,

although I've read the documentation of git very carefully, I could not find 
anything related to certain commit message conventions. It would be great 
if someone here could explain a few things, maybe this could be added to 
the wiki afterwards (<http://git.or.cz/gitwiki/CommitMessageConventions>).

First of all, what's the intended use of the "Signed-off-by:" lines? Does it 
make sense to add my name there, even when I'm listed as the author or 
committer of a commit? I thought that they are intended mostly to note the 
approval of other developers.

On the other hand, concerning the approval of other developers, what's the 
difference between "Signed-off-by:" and "Acked-by:"? Are there any 
more "*-by:" fields that are in use?

Regards,
Tobias

-- 
Tobias Toedter   | "I don't care to belong to a club that accepts people
Hamburg, Germany | like me as members." -- Groucho Marx

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Re: Question about commit message conventions

[Jakub Narebski]

Tobias Toedter wrote:

> Hi,
> 
> although I've read the documentation of git very carefully, I could not find 
> anything related to certain commit message conventions. It would be great 
> if someone here could explain a few things, maybe this could be added to 
> the wiki afterwards (<http://git.or.cz/gitwiki/CommitMessageConventions>).
> 
> First of all, what's the intended use of the "Signed-off-by:" lines? Does it 
> make sense to add my name there, even when I'm listed as the author or 
> committer of a commit? I thought that they are intended mostly to note the 
> approval of other developers.
> 
> On the other hand, concerning the approval of other developers, what's the 
> difference between "Signed-off-by:" and "Acked-by:"? Are there any 
> more "*-by:" fields that are in use?

>From Documentation/SubmittingPatches:

(6) Sign your work
[...]
The sign-off is a simple line at the end of the explanation for
the patch, which certifies that you wrote it or otherwise have
the right to pass it on as a open-source patch.


"Acked-by:" is used to notify that patch was accepted by somebody,
which usually is maintainer of part affected by patch.

I have seen exactly on "Cheered-on-by:", and there are probably some
"Noticed-by:" there.
-- 
Jakub Narebski
Warsaw, Poland
ShadeHawk on #git

Re: Question about commit message conventions

[Erik Mouw]

On Tue, Oct 24, 2006 at 03:49:44PM +0200, Tobias Toedter wrote:
> although I've read the documentation of git very carefully, I could not find 
> anything related to certain commit message conventions. It would be great 
> if someone here could explain a few things, maybe this could be added to 
> the wiki afterwards (<http://git.or.cz/gitwiki/CommitMessageConventions>).
> 
> First of all, what's the intended use of the "Signed-off-by:" lines? Does it 
> make sense to add my name there, even when I'm listed as the author or 
> committer of a commit? I thought that they are intended mostly to note the 
> approval of other developers.

See Documentation/SubmittingPatches. You basically say you have the
right to submit the patch.

> On the other hand, concerning the approval of other developers, what's the 
> difference between "Signed-off-by:" and "Acked-by:"? Are there any 
> more "*-by:" fields that are in use?

Acked-by is usually used when someone (not the upstream maintainer the
patch was send to) agrees with the patch. I.e.: (s)he says the content
of the patch is OK without actually acknowledging something about the
right to submit.


Erik

-- 
+-- Erik Mouw -- www.harddisk-recovery.com -- +31 70 370 12 90 --
| Lab address: Delftechpark 26, 2628 XH, Delft, The Netherlands

Re: Question about commit message conventions

[Tobias Toedter]

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On Tuesday 24 October 2006 16:08, Jakub Narebski wrote:
> Tobias Toedter wrote:
> > although I've read the documentation of git very carefully
[...] 
> From Documentation/SubmittingPatches:

D'oh! Thanks.

Regards,
Tobias

-- 
Tobias Toedter   | "I don't care to belong to a club that accepts people
Hamburg, Germany | like me as members." -- Groucho Marx

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Re: Question about commit message conventions

[Andreas Ericsson]

Erik Mouw wrote:
> On Tue, Oct 24, 2006 at 03:49:44PM +0200, Tobias Toedter wrote:
> 
>> On the other hand, concerning the approval of other developers, what's the 
>> difference between "Signed-off-by:" and "Acked-by:"? Are there any 
>> more "*-by:" fields that are in use?
> 
> Acked-by is usually used when someone (not the upstream maintainer the
> patch was send to) agrees with the patch. I.e.: (s)he says the content
> of the patch is OK without actually acknowledging something about the
> right to submit.
> 

If you sift through the Linux kernel, you will find numerous patches 
where subsystem maintainers have acked patches sent to them. I *think* 
this usually means that they have reviewed the patch and approve of it, 
but not modified it. The Ack is then solely for Linus' benefits and 
tells him that at least one pair of eyes have already gone over the patch.

Subsys maintainers sometimes also add Signed-off-by: lines, which I 
assume means they have tweaked the patch somewhat or somehow 
collaborated with the author in producing it. I know Junio signs off 
patches he modifies, and I'm guessing this habit is inherited from the 
kernel workflow which was most likely encouraged by Linus when he was 
the Git maintainer.

Lots of guesswork here, but in a sane world I can't be too far off the 
mark ;-)

-- 
Andreas Ericsson                   andreas.ericsson@op5.se
OP5 AB                             www.op5.se

Re: Question about commit message conventions

[Junio C Hamano]

Andreas Ericsson <ae@op5.se> writes:

> If you sift through the Linux kernel, you will find numerous patches
> where subsystem maintainers have acked patches sent to them. I *think*
> this usually means that they have reviewed the patch and approve of
> it, but not modified it. The Ack is then solely for Linus' benefits
> and tells him that at least one pair of eyes have already gone over
> the patch.

Correct.

> Subsys maintainers sometimes also add Signed-off-by: lines, which I
> assume means they have tweaked the patch somewhat or somehow
> collaborated with the author in producing it.
>...
> Lots of guesswork here, but in a sane world I can't be too far off the
> mark ;-)

Documentation/SubmittingPatches makes it unnecessary to make any
guesses on S-o-b lines.  Regarding subsystem maintainer
sign-offs, you are referring to DCO 1.1 (b), but the signature
could have been made under DCO 1.1 (c).

In plain terms, the signer vouches that the patch was passed
either intact or with modifications but the original and
modifications are both releasable, to the best of signer's
knowledge, under open source terms.