[PATCH] docs: submitting-patches: document the format for affiliation

[PATCH] docs: submitting-patches: document the format for affiliation

[Jakub Kicinski]

Adding company name in round brackets to From/SoB lines
is fairly common, but I don't see it documented anywhere.
Every now and then people try to add the sponsorship lines
to the commit message, fun example from this merge window:

  Sponsored by:   The FreeBSD Foundation

from commit 2ce67f8bf1ce ("wifi: iwlwifi: mvm: fix iwl_ssid_exist()
check"). Better format would be:

  Author: Miri Korenblit (FreeBSD Foundation) <...

Signed-off-by: Jakub Kicinski <kuba@kernel.org>
---
CC: corbet@lwn.net
CC: workflows@vger.kernel.org
CC: linux-doc@vger.kernel.org
---
 Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst | 6 ++++++
 1 file changed, 6 insertions(+)

diff --git a/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst b/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
index 8fdc0ef3e604..12ed28b3d113 100644
--- a/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
+++ b/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
@@ -717,6 +717,12 @@ patch in the permanent changelog.  If the ``from`` line is missing,
 then the ``From:`` line from the email header will be used to determine
 the patch author in the changelog.
 
+The author may indicate their affiliation or the sponsor of the work
+by adding the name of an organization to the ``from`` and ``SoB`` lines,
+e.g.:
+
+	From: Patch Author (Company) <author@example.com>
+
 Explanation Body
 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
 
-- 
2.48.1

Re: [PATCH] docs: submitting-patches: document the format for affiliation

[Geert Uytterhoeven]

Hi Jakub,

On Mon, 3 Feb 2025 at 18:46, Jakub Kicinski <kuba@kernel.org> wrote:
> Adding company name in round brackets to From/SoB lines
> is fairly common, but I don't see it documented anywhere.
> Every now and then people try to add the sponsorship lines
> to the commit message, fun example from this merge window:
>
>   Sponsored by:   The FreeBSD Foundation
>
> from commit 2ce67f8bf1ce ("wifi: iwlwifi: mvm: fix iwl_ssid_exist()
> check"). Better format would be:
>
>   Author: Miri Korenblit (FreeBSD Foundation) <...
>
> Signed-off-by: Jakub Kicinski <kuba@kernel.org>

Thanks for your patch!

> --- a/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
> +++ b/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
> @@ -717,6 +717,12 @@ patch in the permanent changelog.  If the ``from`` line is missing,
>  then the ``From:`` line from the email header will be used to determine
>  the patch author in the changelog.
>
> +The author may indicate their affiliation or the sponsor of the work
> +by adding the name of an organization to the ``from`` and ``SoB`` lines,
> +e.g.:
> +
> +       From: Patch Author (Company) <author@example.com>
> +

You probably also want to document the other popular[*] solution:

    From: Patch Author <author+company@example.com>

[*] Statistics for v6.0..v6.14-rc1:
      - "(Company): 3430
      - "+company": 2871

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

Re: [PATCH] docs: submitting-patches: document the format for affiliation

[Jakub Kicinski]

On Tue, 4 Feb 2025 08:59:28 +0100 Geert Uytterhoeven wrote:
> You probably also want to document the other popular[*] solution:
> 
>     From: Patch Author <author+company@example.com>
> 
> [*] Statistics for v6.0..v6.14-rc1:
>       - "(Company): 3430
>       - "+company": 2871

Hm, I mostly associate that format with MAINTAINERS entries where
people want email classification. But you're right there are some 
uses, only 3 of them look like companies, tho.

$ git log --format='%ae' v6.0..v6.14-rc1 | grep '+' | sed -e 's/.*+\(.*\)@.*/\1/' | sort | uniq -c | awk '{if ($1 > 5) print;}'
     18 huawei
    464 kernel
     46 lin
    742 linaro
      8 publicgit
   1646 renesas

$ git log --format='%an' v6.0..v6.14-rc1 | sed -n 's/.*(\(.*\))/\1/p' | sort | uniq -c | awk '{if ($1 > 5) print;}'
    177 AMD
    210 Arm
     29 Dent Project
     37 eBPF Foundation
    547 Google
     13 Hanghong Ma
    132 IBM
     46 Intel
     38 Microsoft
     18 Ming Qiang Wu
    155 NGI0
     26 NXP OSS
   1487 Oracle
     19 OSS
      7 Som
     70 Sony
    353 SUSE
      9 tencent
     24 VMware
      8 辛安文

Re: [PATCH] docs: submitting-patches: document the format for affiliation

[Laurent Pinchart]

On Tue, Feb 04, 2025 at 07:18:34AM -0800, Jakub Kicinski wrote:
> On Tue, 4 Feb 2025 08:59:28 +0100 Geert Uytterhoeven wrote:
> > You probably also want to document the other popular[*] solution:
> > 
> >     From: Patch Author <author+company@example.com>
> > 
> > [*] Statistics for v6.0..v6.14-rc1:
> >       - "(Company): 3430
> >       - "+company": 2871
> 
> Hm, I mostly associate that format with MAINTAINERS entries where
> people want email classification. But you're right there are some 
> uses, only 3 of them look like companies, tho.
> 
> $ git log --format='%ae' v6.0..v6.14-rc1 | grep '+' | sed -e 's/.*+\(.*\)@.*/\1/' | sort | uniq -c | awk '{if ($1 > 5) print;}'
>      18 huawei
>     464 kernel
>      46 lin
>     742 linaro
>       8 publicgit
>    1646 renesas
> 
> $ git log --format='%an' v6.0..v6.14-rc1 | sed -n 's/.*(\(.*\))/\1/p' | sort | uniq -c | awk '{if ($1 > 5) print;}'
>     177 AMD
>     210 Arm
>      29 Dent Project
>      37 eBPF Foundation
>     547 Google
>      13 Hanghong Ma
>     132 IBM
>      46 Intel
>      38 Microsoft
>      18 Ming Qiang Wu
>     155 NGI0
>      26 NXP OSS
>    1487 Oracle
>      19 OSS
>       7 Som
>      70 Sony
>     353 SUSE
>       9 tencent
>      24 VMware
>       8 辛安文

Note that some of those are name components:

      7 Somashekhar(Som) <somashekhar.puttagangaiah@intel.com>
     13 Leo (Hanghong) Ma <hanghong.ma@amd.com>
     18 David (Ming Qiang) Wu <David.Wu3@amd.com>

In two cases the component between parentheses is in the middle of the
name, so it can be differentiated from a company name, but that's not
always the case. Automatic parsing of author names (or other tags) is
ambiguous.

We also have cases where the additional text refers to a team within a
company, already properly identified by the e-mail address:

     15 Jan Petrous (OSS) <jan.petrous@oss.nxp.com>
     26 Radu Pirea (NXP OSS) <radu-nicolae.pirea@oss.nxp.com>

Or apparently project or customer names for consulting companies:

     29 Kory Maincent (Dent Project) <kory.maincent@bootlin.com>
     34 Alexis Lothoré (eBPF Foundation) <alexis.lothore@bootlin.com>

The other cases correctly refer to companeis, for contributors using
other email addresses:

      14 linux.dev
      41 zytor.com
      47 joelfernandes.org
     176 alien8.de
     243 gmail.com
     333 goodmis.org
     454 armlinux.org.uk
     918 infradead.org
    1007 kernel.org

Do we want to only document existing practices, or also tell which
one(s) should be favoured ?

-- 
Regards,

Laurent Pinchart

Re: [PATCH] docs: submitting-patches: document the format for affiliation

[Jakub Kicinski]

On Tue, 4 Feb 2025 17:49:38 +0200 Laurent Pinchart wrote:
> Or apparently project or customer names for consulting companies:
> 
>      29 Kory Maincent (Dent Project) <kory.maincent@bootlin.com>
>      34 Alexis Lothoré (eBPF Foundation) <alexis.lothore@bootlin.com>

FWIW these are customer names, indeed. Project/Foundation pays for
contracting work in both cases.

> The other cases correctly refer to companeis, for contributors using
> other email addresses:
> 
>       14 linux.dev
>       41 zytor.com
>       47 joelfernandes.org
>      176 alien8.de
>      243 gmail.com
>      333 goodmis.org
>      454 armlinux.org.uk
>      918 infradead.org
>     1007 kernel.org
> 
> Do we want to only document existing practices, or also tell which
> one(s) should be favoured ?

I'm hoping that documenting the most prevalent existing practice
will naturally make it favored. IOW I'd prefer to document just 
one option. I don't really care which one we pick, but the brackets
seem most common.

Re: [PATCH] docs: submitting-patches: document the format for affiliation

[Randy Dunlap]

Hi,

On 2/4/25 8:13 AM, Jakub Kicinski wrote:
> On Tue, 4 Feb 2025 17:49:38 +0200 Laurent Pinchart wrote:
>> Or apparently project or customer names for consulting companies:
>>
>>      29 Kory Maincent (Dent Project) <kory.maincent@bootlin.com>
>>      34 Alexis Lothoré (eBPF Foundation) <alexis.lothore@bootlin.com>
> 
> FWIW these are customer names, indeed. Project/Foundation pays for
> contracting work in both cases.
> 
>> The other cases correctly refer to companeis, for contributors using
>> other email addresses:
>>
>>       14 linux.dev
>>       41 zytor.com
>>       47 joelfernandes.org
>>      176 alien8.de
>>      243 gmail.com
>>      333 goodmis.org
>>      454 armlinux.org.uk
>>      918 infradead.org
>>     1007 kernel.org
>>
>> Do we want to only document existing practices, or also tell which
>> one(s) should be favoured ?
> 
> I'm hoping that documenting the most prevalent existing practice
> will naturally make it favored. IOW I'd prefer to document just 
> one option. I don't really care which one we pick, but the brackets
> seem most common.
> 

I thought that
Signed-off-by: John Doe <jdoe@example.com> # Company
would be acceptable also.

It looks like that format is documented for Acked-by: but I don't know
why it is not more generally applicable. I'm pretty sure that I have used it
a few times. ;)

-- 
~Randy

Re: [PATCH] docs: submitting-patches: document the format for affiliation

[Jakub Kicinski]

On Tue, 4 Feb 2025 10:05:12 -0800 Randy Dunlap wrote:
> Signed-off-by: John Doe <jdoe@example.com> # Company

Interesting :)

On a quick look this seems to be the format of choice for maintainers
who edit patches:

Signed-off-by: Mr Maintainer <jdoe@example.com> # fixed xyz

I don't see a single # use in the From lines. I think the # formatting
is well suited for free form comments. Less so for things which may need
to be machine readable (for development statistics).

Re: [PATCH] docs: submitting-patches: document the format for affiliation

[Geert Uytterhoeven]

Hi Jakub,

On Tue, 4 Feb 2025 at 20:33, Jakub Kicinski <kuba@kernel.org> wrote:
> On Tue, 4 Feb 2025 10:05:12 -0800 Randy Dunlap wrote:
> > Signed-off-by: John Doe <jdoe@example.com> # Company
>
> Interesting :)
>
> On a quick look this seems to be the format of choice for maintainers
> who edit patches:
>
> Signed-off-by: Mr Maintainer <jdoe@example.com> # fixed xyz
>
> I don't see a single # use in the From lines. I think the # formatting

Because email does not support doing that?

> is well suited for free form comments. Less so for things which may need

On, Acked/Reviewed-by-tags, it's indeed used mostly for comments.
For editing patches, there exists another notation:

    [jane: fixed xyz]
    Signed-off-by: Jane Maintainer <jdoe@example.com>

> to be machine readable (for development statistics).

Agreed.

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

Re: [PATCH] docs: submitting-patches: document the format for affiliation

[Konstantin Ryabitsev]

On Tue, Feb 04, 2025 at 10:05:12AM -0800, Randy Dunlap wrote:
> I thought that
> Signed-off-by: John Doe <jdoe@example.com> # Company
> would be acceptable also.
> 
> It looks like that format is documented for Acked-by: but I don't know
> why it is not more generally applicable. I'm pretty sure that I have used it
> a few times. ;)

I'd say that, in general, we should try to keep the person-trailers to be in
the same format as RFC2822 headers, so I have a mild preference towards not
using hash-comments here.

So, I would stick to:

| Signed-off-by: Alex Dev (Company) <adev@example.com>

-K

Re: [PATCH] docs: submitting-patches: document the format for affiliation

[Yanteng Si]

在 2025/2/4 01:46, Jakub Kicinski 写道:
> Adding company name in round brackets to From/SoB lines
> is fairly common, but I don't see it documented anywhere.
> Every now and then people try to add the sponsorship lines
> to the commit message, fun example from this merge window:
>
>    Sponsored by:   The FreeBSD Foundation
>
> from commit 2ce67f8bf1ce ("wifi: iwlwifi: mvm: fix iwl_ssid_exist()
> check"). Better format would be:
>
>    Author: Miri Korenblit (FreeBSD Foundation) <...
>
> Signed-off-by: Jakub Kicinski <kuba@kernel.org>
> ---
> CC: corbet@lwn.net
> CC: workflows@vger.kernel.org
> CC: linux-doc@vger.kernel.org
> ---
>   Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst | 6 ++++++
>   1 file changed, 6 insertions(+)
>
> diff --git a/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst b/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
> index 8fdc0ef3e604..12ed28b3d113 100644
> --- a/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
> +++ b/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
> @@ -717,6 +717,12 @@ patch in the permanent changelog.  If the ``from`` line is missing,
>   then the ``From:`` line from the email header will be used to determine
>   the patch author in the changelog.
>   
> +The author may indicate their affiliation or the sponsor of the work
> +by adding the name of an organization to the ``from`` and ``SoB`` lines,
> +e.g.:
> +
> +	From: Patch Author (Company) <author@example.com>
> +
It looks great, but I'm a bit worried that it could be misused,
which might cause trouble for some companies. Even without
this patch, there's no way to prevent the misuse.
Consider the following situation:

From: Yanteng Si (linux foundation) <si.yanteng@linux.dev>

Obviously, I'm not a member of the Linux Foundation.

This might seem a bit absurd, but I think it could actually happen,
especially with some driver code. Hardware manufacturers would
prefer to upstream their code under the guidance of their companies,
considering subsequent hardware iterations. However, if some
enthusiasts pretend to be company employees, and the maintainer,
trusting the tag, actively applies the patches, it could disrupt the
rhythm of the hardware manufacturers and is not conducive to code
maintenance in the long run.

How about we add one more part: The organization name in
the parentheses doesn't necessarily represent the developer's
relationship with that organization, especially when it doesn't
match the email domain name. Maintainers should be cautious
and verify carefully before applying patches.


Thanks,
Yanteng

Re: [PATCH] docs: submitting-patches: document the format for affiliation

[Krzysztof Kozlowski]

On 05/02/2025 08:37, Yanteng Si wrote:
> 
> 
> 
> 在 2025/2/4 01:46, Jakub Kicinski 写道:
>> Adding company name in round brackets to From/SoB lines
>> is fairly common, but I don't see it documented anywhere.
>> Every now and then people try to add the sponsorship lines
>> to the commit message, fun example from this merge window:
>>
>>    Sponsored by:   The FreeBSD Foundation
>>
>> from commit 2ce67f8bf1ce ("wifi: iwlwifi: mvm: fix iwl_ssid_exist()
>> check"). Better format would be:
>>
>>    Author: Miri Korenblit (FreeBSD Foundation) <...
>>
>> Signed-off-by: Jakub Kicinski <kuba@kernel.org>
>> ---
>> CC: corbet@lwn.net
>> CC: workflows@vger.kernel.org
>> CC: linux-doc@vger.kernel.org
>> ---
>>   Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst | 6 ++++++
>>   1 file changed, 6 insertions(+)
>>
>> diff --git a/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst b/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
>> index 8fdc0ef3e604..12ed28b3d113 100644
>> --- a/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
>> +++ b/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
>> @@ -717,6 +717,12 @@ patch in the permanent changelog.  If the ``from`` line is missing,
>>   then the ``From:`` line from the email header will be used to determine
>>   the patch author in the changelog.
>>   
>> +The author may indicate their affiliation or the sponsor of the work
>> +by adding the name of an organization to the ``from`` and ``SoB`` lines,
>> +e.g.:
>> +
>> +	From: Patch Author (Company) <author@example.com>
>> +
> It looks great, but I'm a bit worried that it could be misused,
> which might cause trouble for some companies. Even without
> this patch, there's no way to prevent the misuse.
> Consider the following situation:
> 
> From: Yanteng Si (linux foundation) <si.yanteng@linux.dev>
> 
> Obviously, I'm not a member of the Linux Foundation.


Nothing stops you from doing this now, because mentioned format is
already accepted.

> 
> This might seem a bit absurd, but I think it could actually happen,
> especially with some driver code. Hardware manufacturers would
> prefer to upstream their code under the guidance of their companies,
> considering subsequent hardware iterations. However, if some
> enthusiasts pretend to be company employees, and the maintainer,
> trusting the tag, actively applies the patches, it could disrupt the
> rhythm of the hardware manufacturers and is not conducive to code
> maintenance in the long run.


We trust people, not companies, so I think it does not matter for the
trust what is written in ().


> 
> How about we add one more part: The organization name in
> the parentheses doesn't necessarily represent the developer's
> relationship with that organization, especially when it doesn't
> match the email domain name. Maintainers should be cautious
> and verify carefully before applying patches.

Sorry, but how? First, maintainers have already a lot on their plate and
you want to ask them to do some more checks? And how would these checks
look like? Shall I ask people to give me certificates of employement or
their contracts?

The original Jakub's text is quite clear and does not mean AT ALL that
developer represents organisation.


Best regards,
Krzysztof

Re: [PATCH] docs: submitting-patches: document the format for affiliation

[Yanteng Si]

在 2/5/25 22:23, Krzysztof Kozlowski 写道:
> On 05/02/2025 08:37, Yanteng Si wrote:
>>
>>
>> 在 2025/2/4 01:46, Jakub Kicinski 写道:
>>> Adding company name in round brackets to From/SoB lines
>>> is fairly common, but I don't see it documented anywhere.
>>> Every now and then people try to add the sponsorship lines
>>> to the commit message, fun example from this merge window:
>>>
>>>     Sponsored by:   The FreeBSD Foundation
>>>
>>> from commit 2ce67f8bf1ce ("wifi: iwlwifi: mvm: fix iwl_ssid_exist()
>>> check"). Better format would be:
>>>
>>>     Author: Miri Korenblit (FreeBSD Foundation) <...
>>>
>>> Signed-off-by: Jakub Kicinski <kuba@kernel.org>
>>> ---
>>> CC: corbet@lwn.net
>>> CC: workflows@vger.kernel.org
>>> CC: linux-doc@vger.kernel.org
>>> ---
>>>    Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst | 6 ++++++
>>>    1 file changed, 6 insertions(+)
>>>
>>> diff --git a/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst b/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
>>> index 8fdc0ef3e604..12ed28b3d113 100644
>>> --- a/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
>>> +++ b/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
>>> @@ -717,6 +717,12 @@ patch in the permanent changelog.  If the ``from`` line is missing,
>>>    then the ``From:`` line from the email header will be used to determine
>>>    the patch author in the changelog.
>>>    
>>> +The author may indicate their affiliation or the sponsor of the work
>>> +by adding the name of an organization to the ``from`` and ``SoB`` lines,
>>> +e.g.:
>>> +
>>> +	From: Patch Author (Company) <author@example.com>
>>> +
>> It looks great, but I'm a bit worried that it could be misused,
>> which might cause trouble for some companies. Even without
>> this patch, there's no way to prevent the misuse.
>> Consider the following situation:
>>
>> From: Yanteng Si (linux foundation) <si.yanteng@linux.dev>
>>
>> Obviously, I'm not a member of the Linux Foundation.
>
> Nothing stops you from doing this now, because mentioned format is
> already accepted.
>
>> This might seem a bit absurd, but I think it could actually happen,
>> especially with some driver code. Hardware manufacturers would
>> prefer to upstream their code under the guidance of their companies,
>> considering subsequent hardware iterations. However, if some
>> enthusiasts pretend to be company employees, and the maintainer,
>> trusting the tag, actively applies the patches, it could disrupt the
>> rhythm of the hardware manufacturers and is not conducive to code
>> maintenance in the long run.
>
> We trust people, not companies, so I think it does not matter for the
> trust what is written in ().
>
>
>> How about we add one more part: The organization name in
>> the parentheses doesn't necessarily represent the developer's
>> relationship with that organization, especially when it doesn't
>> match the email domain name. Maintainers should be cautious
>> and verify carefully before applying patches.
> Sorry, but how? First, maintainers have already a lot on their plate and
> you want to ask them to do some more checks? And how would these checks
> look like? Shall I ask people to give me certificates of employement or
> their contracts?

That's not necessary. Just ignore the content inside the parentheses

during the review. This will instead reduce the workload of the maintainers.


Thanks,

Yanteng

Re: [PATCH] docs: submitting-patches: document the format for affiliation

[Krzysztof Kozlowski]

On 05/02/2025 15:52, Yanteng Si wrote:
> 
> 在 2/5/25 22:23, Krzysztof Kozlowski 写道:
>> On 05/02/2025 08:37, Yanteng Si wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>> 在 2025/2/4 01:46, Jakub Kicinski 写道:
>>>> Adding company name in round brackets to From/SoB lines
>>>> is fairly common, but I don't see it documented anywhere.
>>>> Every now and then people try to add the sponsorship lines
>>>> to the commit message, fun example from this merge window:
>>>>
>>>>     Sponsored by:   The FreeBSD Foundation
>>>>
>>>> from commit 2ce67f8bf1ce ("wifi: iwlwifi: mvm: fix iwl_ssid_exist()
>>>> check"). Better format would be:
>>>>
>>>>     Author: Miri Korenblit (FreeBSD Foundation) <...
>>>>
>>>> Signed-off-by: Jakub Kicinski <kuba@kernel.org>
>>>> ---
>>>> CC: corbet@lwn.net
>>>> CC: workflows@vger.kernel.org
>>>> CC: linux-doc@vger.kernel.org
>>>> ---
>>>>    Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst | 6 ++++++
>>>>    1 file changed, 6 insertions(+)
>>>>
>>>> diff --git a/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst b/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
>>>> index 8fdc0ef3e604..12ed28b3d113 100644
>>>> --- a/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
>>>> +++ b/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
>>>> @@ -717,6 +717,12 @@ patch in the permanent changelog.  If the ``from`` line is missing,
>>>>    then the ``From:`` line from the email header will be used to determine
>>>>    the patch author in the changelog.
>>>>    
>>>> +The author may indicate their affiliation or the sponsor of the work
>>>> +by adding the name of an organization to the ``from`` and ``SoB`` lines,
>>>> +e.g.:
>>>> +
>>>> +	From: Patch Author (Company) <author@example.com>
>>>> +
>>> It looks great, but I'm a bit worried that it could be misused,
>>> which might cause trouble for some companies. Even without
>>> this patch, there's no way to prevent the misuse.
>>> Consider the following situation:
>>>
>>> From: Yanteng Si (linux foundation) <si.yanteng@linux.dev>
>>>
>>> Obviously, I'm not a member of the Linux Foundation.
>>
>> Nothing stops you from doing this now, because mentioned format is
>> already accepted.
>>
>>> This might seem a bit absurd, but I think it could actually happen,
>>> especially with some driver code. Hardware manufacturers would
>>> prefer to upstream their code under the guidance of their companies,
>>> considering subsequent hardware iterations. However, if some
>>> enthusiasts pretend to be company employees, and the maintainer,
>>> trusting the tag, actively applies the patches, it could disrupt the
>>> rhythm of the hardware manufacturers and is not conducive to code
>>> maintenance in the long run.
>>
>> We trust people, not companies, so I think it does not matter for the
>> trust what is written in ().
>>
>>
>>> How about we add one more part: The organization name in
>>> the parentheses doesn't necessarily represent the developer's
>>> relationship with that organization, especially when it doesn't
>>> match the email domain name. Maintainers should be cautious
>>> and verify carefully before applying patches.
>> Sorry, but how? First, maintainers have already a lot on their plate and
>> you want to ask them to do some more checks? And how would these checks
>> look like? Shall I ask people to give me certificates of employement or
>> their contracts?
> 
> That's not necessary. Just ignore the content inside the parentheses
> 
> during the review. This will instead reduce the workload of the maintainers.
Hm? You said submitting patches document should instruct maintainers to
"verify carefully". Verify what?

We all ignore the content inside the parentheses, because it is not
relevant to the code. I don't understand what sort of problem you want
to solve with proposed text.

Best regards,
Krzysztof

Re: [PATCH] docs: submitting-patches: document the format for affiliation

[Yanteng Si]

Sorry, I accidentally sent an HTML email because I just

reset my production environment. I'm resending it to

the mailing list now. If the recipients of the previous

email have subscribed to the mailing list, they may

receive two emails. Apologies for the inconvenience.

>>>>>
>>>>> diff --git a/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst b/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
>>>>> index 8fdc0ef3e604..12ed28b3d113 100644
>>>>> --- a/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
>>>>> +++ b/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
>>>>> @@ -717,6 +717,12 @@ patch in the permanent changelog.  If the ``from`` line is missing,
>>>>>     then the ``From:`` line from the email header will be used to determine
>>>>>     the patch author in the changelog.
>>>>>     
>>>>> +The author may indicate their affiliation or the sponsor of the work
>>>>> +by adding the name of an organization to the ``from`` and ``SoB`` lines,
>>>>> +e.g.:
>>>>> +
>>>>> +	From: Patch Author (Company) <author@example.com>
>>>>> +
>>>> It looks great, but I'm a bit worried that it could be misused,
>>>> which might cause trouble for some companies. Even without
>>>> this patch, there's no way to prevent the misuse.
>>>> Consider the following situation:
>>>>
>>>> From: Yanteng Si (linux foundation) <si.yanteng@linux.dev>
>>>>
>>>> Obviously, I'm not a member of the Linux Foundation.
>>> Nothing stops you from doing this now, because mentioned format is
>>> already accepted.
>>>
>>>> This might seem a bit absurd, but I think it could actually happen,
>>>> especially with some driver code. Hardware manufacturers would
>>>> prefer to upstream their code under the guidance of their companies,
>>>> considering subsequent hardware iterations. However, if some
>>>> enthusiasts pretend to be company employees, and the maintainer,
>>>> trusting the tag, actively applies the patches, it could disrupt the
>>>> rhythm of the hardware manufacturers and is not conducive to code
>>>> maintenance in the long run.
>>> We trust people, not companies, so I think it does not matter for the
>>> trust what is written in ().
>>>
>>>
>>>> How about we add one more part: The organization name in
>>>> the parentheses doesn't necessarily represent the developer's
>>>> relationship with that organization, especially when it doesn't
>>>> match the email domain name. Maintainers should be cautious
>>>> and verify carefully before applying patches.
>>> Sorry, but how? First, maintainers have already a lot on their plate and
>>> you want to ask them to do some more checks? And how would these checks
>>> look like? Shall I ask people to give me certificates of employement or
>>> their contracts?
>> That's not necessary. Just ignore the content inside the parentheses
>>
>> during the review. This will instead reduce the workload of the maintainers.
> Hm? You said submitting patches document should instruct maintainers to
> "verify carefully". Verify what?
If the maintainer ignores the content in the brackets,
there is no need for verification. If the maintainer unavoidably
takes into account the content in the brackets while reviewing
the code, then the maintainer can ask the developer to contact
the organization mentioned in the brackets to help review the patch.
>
> We all ignore the content inside the parentheses, because it is not
> relevant to the code. I don't understand what sort of problem you want
> to solve with proposed text.

My original intention was to clarify this matter in the form of a document.


Thanks,

Yanteng

Re: [PATCH] docs: submitting-patches: document the format for affiliation

[Jonathan Corbet]

Jakub Kicinski <kuba@kernel.org> writes:

> Adding company name in round brackets to From/SoB lines
> is fairly common, but I don't see it documented anywhere.
> Every now and then people try to add the sponsorship lines
> to the commit message, fun example from this merge window:
>
>   Sponsored by:   The FreeBSD Foundation
>
> from commit 2ce67f8bf1ce ("wifi: iwlwifi: mvm: fix iwl_ssid_exist()
> check"). Better format would be:
>
>   Author: Miri Korenblit (FreeBSD Foundation) <...
>
> Signed-off-by: Jakub Kicinski <kuba@kernel.org>
> ---
> CC: corbet@lwn.net
> CC: workflows@vger.kernel.org
> CC: linux-doc@vger.kernel.org
> ---
>  Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst | 6 ++++++
>  1 file changed, 6 insertions(+)
>
> diff --git a/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst b/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
> index 8fdc0ef3e604..12ed28b3d113 100644
> --- a/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
> +++ b/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
> @@ -717,6 +717,12 @@ patch in the permanent changelog.  If the ``from`` line is missing,
>  then the ``From:`` line from the email header will be used to determine
>  the patch author in the changelog.
>  
> +The author may indicate their affiliation or the sponsor of the work
> +by adding the name of an organization to the ``from`` and ``SoB`` lines,
> +e.g.:
> +
> +	From: Patch Author (Company) <author@example.com>
> +
>  Explanation Body
>  ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

So, despite all the conversation, I didn't see any real opposition to
adding this change, so I've applied it.

Amusingly, b4 helpfully picked up these tags from the conversation:

 + Signed-off-by: John Doe <jdoe@example.com> (✓DKIM/infradead.org)
 + Signed-off-by: Mr Maintainer <jdoe@example.com> (✓DKIM/kernel.org)
 + Signed-off-by: Jane Maintainer <jdoe@example.com>

Tempting as it was to leave them in, I took them out :)

Thanks,

jon

Re: [PATCH] docs: submitting-patches: document the format for affiliation

[Konstantin Ryabitsev]

On Mon, Feb 10, 2025 at 11:38:46AM -0700, Jonathan Corbet wrote:
> So, despite all the conversation, I didn't see any real opposition to
> adding this change, so I've applied it.
> 
> Amusingly, b4 helpfully picked up these tags from the conversation:
> 
>  + Signed-off-by: John Doe <jdoe@example.com> (✓DKIM/infradead.org)
>  + Signed-off-by: Mr Maintainer <jdoe@example.com> (✓DKIM/kernel.org)
>  + Signed-off-by: Jane Maintainer <jdoe@example.com>
> 
> Tempting as it was to leave them in, I took them out :)

We should probably have something like "neverdomains" that includes
"example\..*", so I'm going to make a note of this.

-K