Re: [PATCH 0/3] Towards a re-organized submitting patches

[Thorsten Leemhuis <linux@leemhuis.info>]

On 05.03.24 13:59, Jonathan Corbet wrote:
> Thorsten Leemhuis <linux@leemhuis.info> writes:
>> On 03.03.24 17:31, Jonathan Corbet wrote:
>>> Lukas Bulwahn <lukas.bulwahn@gmail.com> writes:
>>>> I wanted to clean up the development-process documentation. There is
>>>> however no easy way to break the ice here:
>>>>
>>>> The elephant in the room is that there is some unclear relation between
>>>> 5.Posting.rst, 6.Followthrough.rst and submitting-patches.rst.
>>>> (Yes, I know each document has its own history...; but let us put the
>>>> history aside for now.)
>>>
>>> FWIW, the objective of those two documents is quite different; one is a
>>> high-level overview of how the development process as a whole works, the
>>> other is a detailed guide to submitting work for consideration.
>>
>> Sorry, I'm slightly confused here, so I have to ask: which is which?
>>
>> Due to the "*essential*" in the headline of submitting-patches.rst and
>> its "For *detailed* information on how the kernel development process
>> works, see Documentation/process/development-process.rst" in the intro
>> make it sounds to me like submitting-patches.rst should be the one with
>> the high-level overview. But...
>>
>>> Again, let's remember the different purposes of these documents.  The
>>> development-process document is an overall description of the process,
>>> so it doesn't need the details.
>>
>> ...this makes it sounds like you consider it the other way around. And
>> for me that feels the wrong, as why describe the overall process in
>> detail, but leave the most important part of the process to some other
>> document?
>>
>> /me wonders what he is missing
> 
> The series of files starting with Documentation/process/1.Intro.rst was
> meant to describe the whole of the development process to a wider
> audience; I originally wrote it as a project for the Linux Foundation.
> It covers far more than the business of putting up patches for
> consideration - development cycles and all that.
> 
> submitting-patches.rst, instead, covers the details of getting code
> considered for merging; it is intended to be read by the people actually
> trying to do that work.
> 
> One document describes what the pieces of the car are and how they work
> together to get you to the pub.  The other gives all of the steps for
> working on the brakes without causing accidents.  They both fit as part
> of a larger body of documentation, but they are definitely not the same
> document.

Thx for the clarification. And of course both fit in a larger body. It
seems some of the word used in the intros of both documents made me
assume it was the other way around at some point in the past and then it
stuck. Wondering if that's just me or if that happened to others as
well. Whatever, if Lukas will realize his plans I guess the different
target audiences will become more obvious over time.

Thx again! Ciao, Thorsten