Re: [PATCH] MAINTAINERS: exclude char maintainers from things they do not maintain

[Greg Kroah-Hartman <gregkh@linuxfoundation.org>]

On Wed, Sep 30, 2020 at 11:41:10PM -0700, Joe Perches wrote:
> On Thu, 2020-10-01 at 08:29 +0200, Greg Kroah-Hartman wrote:
> > On Wed, Sep 30, 2020 at 01:02:46PM -0700, Joe Perches wrote:
> > > On Wed, 2020-09-30 at 18:28 +0200, Greg Kroah-Hartman wrote:
> > > > On Wed, Sep 30, 2020 at 08:36:56AM -0500, Corey Minyard wrote:
> > > > > On Wed, Sep 30, 2020 at 02:10:07PM +0200, Greg Kroah-Hartman wrote:
> > > > > > There are a number of subdirectories and files in drivers/char/ that
> > > > > > have their own maintainers and developers and ways of getting patches to
> > > > > > Linus.  This includes random.c, IPMI, hardware random drivers, TPM
> > > > > > drivers, and agp drivers.  Instead of sending those patches to Arnd and
> > > > > > myself, who can't do anything with them, send them to the proper
> > > > > > developers instead.
> []
> > > Your exclusion list is:
> > > 
> > > +X:	drivers/char/agp/
> > > +X:	drivers/char/hw_random/
> > > +X:	drivers/char/ipmi/
> > > +X:	drivers/char/random.c
> > > +X:	drivers/char/tpm/
> > > 
> > > But the current subdirectories of drivers/char are:
> > > 
> > > drivers/char/agp
> > > drivers/char/hw_random
> > > drivers/char/ipmi
> > > drivers/char/mwave
> > > drivers/char/pcmcia
> > > drivers/char/tpm
> > > drivers/char/tpm/eventlog
> > > drivers/char/tpm/st33zp24
> > > drivers/char/xilinx_hwicap
> > > drivers/char/xillybus
> > > 
> > > do you want to specifically maintain any of them?
> > 
> > Yes, the other ones we do maintain.
> > 
> > > Wouldn't it be easier to add a single subdirectory exclusion
> > > and add specific inclusions for subdirectories you actually
> > > do want to maintain>
> > > 
> > > 
> > > X:	drivers/char/*/
> > > F:	drivers/char/<whatever>
> > 
> > If we do that, it will be one extra line in the MAINTAINERS file, as we
> > are dealing with 4 we want, and 4 we don't :)
> > 
> > I like being explicit as to what we do NOT want to review, it's easier
> > to see when glancing at the file.
> 
> No worries, it just wasn't obvious that all the other
> directories were ones you actually want to maintain.

Someone has to :)

> btw: xillybus nominally has its own maintainer too.
> 
> XILLYBUS DRIVER
> M:	Eli Billauer <eli.billauer@gmail.com>
> L:	linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org
> S:	Supported
> F:	drivers/char/xillybus/

I end up usually taking the patches from here so leaving it as part of
the "umbrella" for char/misc patches is fine.

thanks,

greg k-h