Re: [PATCH] x86: !x & y typo in mtrr code

Ingo Molnar
2008-04-30T12:36:00Z

* Björn Steinbrink <B.Steinbrink@gmx.de> wrote:

> On 2008.04.30 11:32:33 +0200, Ingo Molnar wrote:
> > Automating Sparse runs so that it can become part of our daily
> > patch-flow is _not_ trivial and it's not just a matter of typing
> > make C=1. Thomas is working on integrating Sparse delta analysis
> > into our daily patch workflow nevertheless.
>
> Who said daily? More often can be better, but just before the pull
> request is still better than nothing. [...]

Suffice to say that the number of large subsystems that actually run
Sparse before each and every pull request is extremely low - this simply
matches the practical difficulties involved.

You are suggesting ad-hoc solutions without having tried it all
yourself. And i'd very much agree with doing an upstream kernel Sparse
sweep shortly before the final release. Do you volunteer for that?

We for one simply concentrate on the the things that we think makes it
more likely to find bugs. For example we build and boot x86.git with
many different configs before every pull request. In practice that
catches far more tester-critical bugs than Sparse - and we know that
simply from the fact because we use both methods and have a good
comparison of the results. We also work on automating Sparse checks in
the future but as i said it, it's not easy.

Ingo