Date: Wed, 14 Nov 2007 18:23:34 -0500 (EST)
From: Daniel Barkalow <barkalow@iabervon.org>
To: Theodore Tso <tytso@mit.edu>
cc: Benoit Boissinot <bboissin@gmail.com>, Mark Lord <liml@rtr.ca>,
       Ingo Molnar <mingo@elte.hu>, Andrew Morton <akpm@linux-foundation.org>,
       David Miller <davem@davemloft.net>, protasnb@gmail.com,
       linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org, netdev@vger.kernel.org,
       alsa-devel@alsa-project.org, linux-ide@vger.kernel.org,
       linux-pcmcia@lists.infradead.org, linux-input@atrey.karlin.mff.cuni.cz,
       bugme-daemon@bugzilla.kernel.org
Subject: Re: [BUG] New Kernel Bugs
In-Reply-To: <20071113171356.GA25824@thunk.org>
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.64.0711141810110.12193@iabervon.org>
References: <20071113031553.3c7b5c16.akpm@linux-foundation.org>
 <20071113.033946.114918709.davem@davemloft.net> <20071113034916.2556edd7.akpm@linux-foundation.org>
 <20071113.035824.40509981.davem@davemloft.net> <20071113041259.79c9a8c5.akpm@linux-foundation.org>
 <20071113134029.GA30978@elte.hu> <4739AFE0.20705@rtr.ca>
 <40f323d00711130752k19cab8eauc3456721274b3267@mail.gmail.com>
 <20071113171356.GA25824@thunk.org>
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On Tue, 13 Nov 2007, Theodore Tso wrote:

> There are two parts to this.  One is a Ubuntu development kernel which
> we can give to large numbers of people to expand our testing pool.
> But if we don't do a better job of responding to bug reports that
> would be generated by expanded testing this won't necessarily help us.
> 
> The other an automated set of standard pre-built bisection points so
> that testers can more easily localize a bug down to a few hundred
> commits without needing to learn how to use "git bisect" (think Ubuntu
> users).

I don't see any reason that we couldn't have a tool accessible to Ubuntu 
users that does a real "git bisect". Git is really good at being scripted 
by fancy GUIs. It should be easy enough to have a drop down with all of 
the Ubuntu kernel package releases, where the user selects what works and 
what doesn't. Then the tool clones a git repository with flags to only get 
relevant parts, and then leads a bisect run, where it's also 
configuring, building, and installing the kernels (as a different grub 
entry), and providing instructions in general. Fundamentally, "git bisect" 
is a really low-interaction process: you tell it a couple of commits, and 
then it does stuff, and then you tell it "I tested, and it worked" or "I 
tested, and it had the problem" or "Something else went wrong", and it 
asks you something new. Other than that, it just takes time (and a build 
system hook, which this tool would handle for the kernel). Eventually, it 
tells you what to report, and you do so.

	-Daniel
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