Re: [PATCH 0/4] Add agent coding assistant configuration to Linux kernel

[Jiri Kosina <kosina@gmail.com>]

On Mon, 4 Aug 2025, Sasha Levin wrote:

> > The above guidance is quite vague. How me as a maintainer should know
> > that whatever AI tool has been used is meeting those two conditions
> 
> In exactly the same way you know that a human contributor didn't copy
> code with an incompatible license.
> 
> Quoting from Documentation/process/5.Posting.rst :
> 
> 	 - Signed-off-by: this is a developer's certification that he or
> 	   she has the right to submit the patch for inclusion into the
> 	   kernel.  It is an agreement to the Developer's Certificate of
> 	   Origin, the full text of which can be found in
> 	   :ref:`Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
> 	   <submittingpatches>` Code without a proper signoff cannot be
> 	   merged into the mainline.
> 
> The Signed-off-by tag doesn't mean that a commit was reviewed, it
> doesn't mean that someone tested it, nor does it indicate that the
> person who signed off belives it is correct.
> 
> It only means that the person has legally certified to you what is
> stated in the DCO.

Al made a very important point somewhere earlier in this thread.

The most important (from the code quality POV) thing is -- is there a 
person that understands the patch enough to be able to answer questions 
(coming from some other human -- most likely reviewer/maintainer)?

That's not something that'd be reflected in DCO, but it's very important 
fact for the maintainer's decision process.

-- 
Jiri Kosina
SUSE Labs