Re: Link trailers revisited (was Re: [GIT PULL] io_uring fix for 6.17-rc5)

["Rafael J. Wysocki" <rafael@kernel.org>]

On Tue, Sep 9, 2025 at 4:50 PM Jens Axboe <axboe@kernel.dk> wrote:
>
> On 9/9/25 8:48 AM, Vlastimil Babka wrote:
> > On 9/9/25 16:42, Konstantin Ryabitsev wrote:
> >> On Tue, Sep 09, 2025 at 08:35:18AM -0600, Jens Axboe wrote:
> >>>>> On a global scale, that's quite a number of saved mailing list archive searches.
> >>>>
> >>>> +1 FWIW. I also started slapping the links on all patches in a series,
> >>>> even if we apply with a merge commit. I don't know of a good way with
> >>>> git to "get to the first parent merge" so scanning the history to find
> >>>> the link in the cover letter was annoying me :(
> >>>
> >>> Like I've tried to argue, I find them useful too. But after this whole
> >>> mess of a thread, I killed -l from my scripts. I do think it's a mistake
> >>> and it seems like the only reason to remove them is that Linus expects
> >>> to find something at the end of the link rainbow and is often
> >>> disappointed, and that annoys him enough to rant about it.
> >>>
> >>> I know some folks downstream of me on the io_uring side find them useful
> >>> too, because they've asked me several times to please remember to ensure
> >>> my own self-applied patches have the link as well. For those, I tend to
> >>> pick or add them locally rather than use b4 for it, which is why they've
> >>> never had links.
> >>>
> >>> As far as I can tell, only two things have been established here:
> >>>
> >>> 1) Linus hates the Link tags, except if they have extra information
> >>> 2) Lots of other folks find them useful
> >>>
> >>> and hence we're at a solid deadlock here.
> >>
> >> I did suggest that provenance links use the patch.msgid.link subdomain. This
> >
> > Yes, and the PR that started this thread had a normal lore link. Would it
> > have been different with a patch.msgid.link as perhaps Linus would not try
> > opening it and become disappointed?
> > You did kinda ask that early in the thread but then the conversation went in
> > different directions.
>
> I think we all know the answer to that one - it would've been EXACTLY
> the same outcome. Not to put words in Linus' mouth, but it's not the
> name of the tag that he finds repulsive, it's the very fact that a link
> is there and it isn't useful _to him_.

Well, I think that the convention associated with patch.msgid.link is
clear, like for the "Fixes:" and "Cc: stable" tags.  Those tags are
also generally useful, but mostly in the post-development part of the
process, so to speak.

So, if there are no problems with adding "Fixes:" and "Cc: stable"
tags, why would there be a problem with patch.msgid.link?