Re: [Ksummit-discuss] [MAINTAINERS SUMMIT] Patch version changes in commit logs?

[James Bottomley <James.Bottomley@HansenPartnership.com>]

On Wed, 2019-07-03 at 11:56 +0300, Laurent Pinchart wrote:
> On Tue, Jul 02, 2019 at 06:43:47PM -0400, Theodore Ts'o wrote:
> > On Tue, Jul 02, 2019 at 03:26:48PM -0700, James Bottomley wrote:
> > > git is our upstream for version control and our upstream has
> > > already
> > > had this as a feature since 2014.  Trying to go to upstream  5
> > > years
> > > later and ask them to change it is likely going to be a
> > > singularly
> > > unsuccessful exercise, plus even in the unlikely event we can
> > > work out
> > > how to do it compatibly and without causing confusion and
> > > upstream said
> > > yes it would take another few years to propagate.
> > 
> > If we really want to use the Link: header, we should be able to do
> > this without requiring any changes to git.
> > 
> > Step 1)   git config am.messageid true
> > Step 2)   Write and install a .git/hooks/applypatch-msg script
> > which
> > 	  looks for Message-Id: and transmogrifies that line to a
> > 	  Link: trailer, using the lore.kernel.org URL template
> > Step 3)   Document this in Documentation/process.  For bonus points
> > 	  create a script which automatically sets up the user's git
> > 	  configuration by setting up am.messageid config and
> > 	  installing the hook file.
> > Step 4)   Profit
> 
> I may have missed the obvious, but while this should work great for
> patches applied with git-am, what's the expected workflow for patches
> written by the author of a pull request ? I certainly post my own
> patches for review on mailing lists, but I don't fetch them back from
> the list before sending a pull request. Do we want to move towards a
> model where maintainers should retrieve their own patches from the
> lists (or from patchwork) ?

I always apply from the list.  Apart from the obvious benefit of
getting others to review and not giving the impression of a favourite
path into the tree, I do it because as I construct patches and rework
them I actually build the version information into the change log using
rebase (with a --- separating it from the main commit message).  This
is so I can send the emails directly from my tree without having to add
the version change information but it does mean the only way I lose the
version history from my patches when they go into the tree for real is
by doing an am apply from the list.

James