Re: [RFD] Explicitly documenting patch submission

Bradley Hook
2004-05-25T16:02:21Z

Steven Cole wrote:
>
> On May 25, 2004, at 1:06 AM, Arjan van de Ven wrote:
>
>>
>>
>>> explanation part of the patch. That sign-off would be just a single line
>>> at the end (possibly after _other_ peoples sign-offs), saying:
>>>
>>> Signed-off-by: Random J Developer <random@developer.org>
>>
>>
>> well this obviously needs to include that you signed off on the DCO and
>> not some other random piece of paper, and it probably should include the
>> DCO revision number you signed off on.
>> Without the former the Signed-off-by: line is entirely empty afaics,
>> without the later we're not future proof.
>>
>>
>
> How about something like:
>
> DCO 1.0 Signed-off-by: Random J Developer <random@developer.org>
>
> This new process being "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound
> of cure" should retain the property of being lightweight and not
> unduly burdensome. This change seems to fall into that category.
>
> Steven
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Why not design the DCO so that it assumes an author accepts the most
recent published version unless specified. You could then shorten the
line to:

DCO-Sign-Off: Random J Developer <random@developer.org>

And if they wanted to specify a version, use something like:

DCO-Sign-Off: Random J Developer <random@developer.org> [DCO 1.0]

You could also define the signoff line to use different delimiters for
various types of information, to allow for all of these "custom" ideas
that contributing companies may feel they "need".

For example, say any text not enclosed by any delimiters is considered a
name, anything in <> is an email, in [] is a DCO version, and {} allows
for optional information. This would allow for stuff like Yarroll
submitted while I was typing this email, for example:

DCO-Sign-Off: La Monte H.P. Yarroll <piggy@timesys.com> [DCO 1.0] {TS00062}

Nothing other than name and email would be required, but they would be
available for those that wish to use them. This would make it easy for
scripts to sort out the info on this line.

~Brad