From:   Jonathan Corbet <corbet@lwn.net>
To:     David Vernet <void@manifault.com>,
        Bagas Sanjaya <bagasdotme@gmail.com>
Cc:     Linux BPF <bpf@vger.kernel.org>,
        Linux Documentation <linux-doc@vger.kernel.org>,
        Linux Kernel Mailing List <linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org>,
        Alexei Starovoitov <ast@kernel.org>,
        Daniel Borkmann <daniel@iogearbox.net>,
        Andrii Nakryiko <andrii@kernel.org>,
        Martin KaFai Lau <martin.lau@linux.dev>,
        Song Liu <song@kernel.org>, Yonghong Song <yhs@fb.com>,
        John Fastabend <john.fastabend@gmail.com>,
        KP Singh <kpsingh@kernel.org>,
        Stanislav Fomichev <sdf@google.com>,
        Hao Luo <haoluo@google.com>, Jiri Olsa <jolsa@kernel.org>,
        "David S. Miller" <davem@davemloft.net>,
        "Tobin C. Harding" <me@tobin.cc>
Subject: Re: [PATCH bpf-next] bpf, doc: use internal linking for link to
 netdev FAQ
In-Reply-To: <20230313123602.GA2392@maniforge>
References: <20230313025119.17430-1-bagasdotme@gmail.com>
 <20230313030938.GA152792@maniforge> <ZA6knaEQcddfTCyS@debian.me>
 <fefa25fe-8148-cbd7-a91e-e4713eb6b0ef@gmail.com>
 <4653cfd1-7209-6e49-4f01-fcc3f82f16ce@gmail.com>
 <20230313123602.GA2392@maniforge>
Date:   Mon, 13 Mar 2023 07:37:25 -0600
Message-ID: <87wn3kvkkq.fsf@meer.lwn.net>
MIME-Version: 1.0
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David Vernet <void@manifault.com> writes:

> Sure, but there are practicalities to consider here. It takes O(minutes)
> to do a full docs build, as opposed to O(seconds). I've done reviews of
> docs patches where the engineer tried to build the docs tree, but
> thought it was hung and ended up cancelling it. Full docs builds also
> unfortunately spew quite a few warnings in other subtrees. You have to
> carefully wade through the warnings in those other subtrees to ensure
> you haven't added any new ones.
>
> It's hard enough to get people to write documentation. It's also hard
> enough to get them to test building their documentation before
> submitting it. I think there is a lot of value in being able to build
> the documentation for the subtree you're contributing to, and be able to
> have some expectation that it builds cleanly. Let's not make it more
> difficult for the people who are actually adding substantive
> documentation.

I get your point, but that is essentially saying that there should be no
linkages between our documentation subtrees, which defeats much of the
purpose of using a system like Sphinx.

In this specific case, though, there is a better solution.  Text like:

  see the netdev FAQ (Documentation/process/maintainer-netdev.rst)

will add links in the built docs, and also tells readers of the
plain-text files where they should be looking.  Without adding warnings.

For the bigger problem, the right answer is to start using intersphinx.
I guess I need to get serious about playing with that.

Thanks,

jon