Re: [GIT PULL] SCSI fixes for 2.6.32-rc3

[Linus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>]

On Tue, 6 Oct 2009, James Bottomley wrote:
>
> This is mostly fixes.  However, it contains two new drivers: Brocade SAS
> (bfa), the Bladengine2 iSCSI (be2iscsi) under the merge window exemption

Btw, I'm getting less excited about the merge window exemption.

It makes sense for consumer devices that people actually hit and that are 
needed for bringup (ie they make a difference between a system that can be 
installed and used, and one that cannot), but I'm not at all sure it makes 
sense for things like this.

The _reason_ for the driver exemption was the fact that even a broken 
driver is better than no driver at all for somebody who just can't get a 
working system without it, but that argument really goes away when the 
driver is so specialized that it's not about regular hardware any more.

And the whole "driver exemption" seems to have become a by-word for "I can 
ignore the merge window for 50% of my code". Which makes me very tired of 
it if there aren't real advantages to real users.

So I'm seriously considering a "the driver has to be mass market and also 
actually matter to an install" rule for the exemption to be valid.

			Linus