Re: [Ksummit-discuss] Topic: Removal of code that is still in use by users but there is a better code.

[Geert Uytterhoeven <geert@linux-m68k.org>]

On Thu, Jun 12, 2014 at 4:48 AM, Steven Rostedt <rostedt@goodmis.org> wrote:
> On Wed, 11 Jun 2014 16:22:16 -0700
> Guenter Roeck <linux@roeck-us.net> wrote:
>> I understand, but personally I don't have much problem with code as long
>> as it compiles. I am more concerned with code that doesn't compile and
>> no one cared for years.

And once it stops compiling, more issues will be introduced into that area,
which no one notices due to the first compile failure.

> Matters what your definition of "doesn't compile" is.
>
> You may not have the right config option set to make it compile.
> randconfig builds trigger failed compiles quite often. Is that code
> worth removing?
>
> As most people test allyesconfig and allmodconfig quite a bit, I'm not
> sure what code you are talking about. Basically everything that gets
> enabled does compile.

And once it compiles, it usually works!

I have the impression we're getting good (read: having good review) at doing
logical changes, i.e. when code is integrated, it works (almost always :-).
The tricky parts these days are configuration issues, i.e. code that fails to
build for certain configurations, due to various reasons (forgot to handle a
case in another #ifdef branch, code inside vs. outside #ifdef,
different indirect
includes on different architectures, ...). Fortunately the latter can be caught
using more CPU resources, in contrast with more reviewers for the former.

Gr{oetje,eeting}s,

                        Geert

--
Geert Uytterhoeven -- There's lots of Linux beyond ia32 -- geert@linux-m68k.org

In personal conversations with technical people, I call myself a hacker. But
when I'm talking to journalists I just say "programmer" or something like that.
                                -- Linus Torvalds