[U-Boot] U-Boot git usage model

Wolfgang Denk
2012-10-13T19:06:17Z

Dear Scott Wood,

In message <1349974486.6903.5@snotra> you wrote:
>
> Is this documented anywhere?
>
> http://www.denx.de/wiki/U-Boot/DevelopmentProcess says, "U-Boot has
> adopted the Linux kernel signoff policy".
>
> Actual behavior is probably inconsistent between custodians.

This is documented, see previous discussions.

We're referring to linux/Documentation/SubmittingPatches .

Unfortunaltely this leaves room to interpretation, and depending on
thier own interpretation people behave differently.

To me the most interesting part of this document is this section:

If you are a subsystem or branch maintainer, sometimes you need to slightly
modify patches you receive in order to merge them, because the code is not
exactly the same in your tree and the submitters'. If you stick strictly to
rule (c), you should ask the submitter to rediff, but this is a totally
counter-productive waste of time and energy. Rule (b) allows you to adjust
the code, but then it is very impolite to change one submitter's code and
make him endorse your bugs. To solve this problem, it is recommended that
you add a line between the last Signed-off-by header and yours, indicating
the nature of your changes. While there is nothing mandatory about this, it
seems like prepending the description with your mail and/or name, all
enclosed in square brackets, is noticeable enough to make it obvious that
you are responsible for last-minute changes. Example :

Signed-off-by: Random J Developer <random@developer.example.org>
[lucky at maintainer.example.org: struct foo moved from foo.c to foo.h]
Signed-off-by: Lucky K Maintainer <lucky@maintainer.example.org>

This practise is particularly helpful if you maintain a stable branch and
want at the same time to credit the author, track changes, merge the fix,
and protect the submitter from complaints. Note that under no circumstances
can you change the author's identity (the From header), as it is the one
which appears in the changelog.

In my interpretation this means that one should add a SoB line of one
creates or modifies a patch. Just applying it from some published and
recoded form does not include any such modification, so why should I
add my SoB when applying a patch from PW for example?

Best regards,

Wolfgang Denk

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