Re: [Ksummit-2013-discuss] KS Topic request: Handling the Stable kernel, let's dump the cc: stable tag

John W. Linville
2013-07-17T15:08:58Z

On Tue, Jul 16, 2013 at 11:43:36AM +0400, James Bottomley wrote:
> On Mon, 2013-07-15 at 23:20 -0700, Greg KH wrote:
>
> > I think the real stable issue that _everyone_ keeps ignoring, is my
> > original complaint, in that people are using the -rc1 merge window to
> > get fixes in they should have sent to Linus for .0.
>
> You mean we delay fixes to the merge window (tagged for stable) because
> we can't get them into Linus' tree at -rc5 on? Guilty ... that's
> because the friction for getting stuff in rises. It's a big fight to
> get something marginal in after -rc5 ... it's easy to silently tag it
> for stable (did I mention that I think the tag part enables this
> behaviour?).

I'll just chime-in here and agree that I have delayed minor fixes,
preventing them from being merged during an -rc6 or -rc7 but tagging
them for -stable. It has long been 'tradition' (at least in the
networking space) that fixes so late in the cycle should tend to be
really small (i.e. "one-liners") and/or really, really, important.
In other words, they need to avoid potentially delaying a release
unless they are absolutely necessary.

Fixes merged early in the next release cycle at least have a fighting
chance of getting some testing before getting into the hands of the
unwashed masses. If they have problems in 3.<previous>.1 then they
can still be reverted in -stable, but they can never be removed from
the .0 release -- does this matter? I'm not sure. Is having a flood
of fixes in x.y.1 any worse than having to got to an -rc8 or an -rc9?

John
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John W. Linville Someday the world will need a hero, and you
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