Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id ; Wed, 30 Jan 2002 11:15:27 -0500 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id ; Wed, 30 Jan 2002 11:13:33 -0500 Received: from [216.247.238.190] ([216.247.238.190]:24589 "HELO pakistanmail.com") by vger.kernel.org with SMTP id ; Wed, 30 Jan 2002 11:12:51 -0500 From: grumph@pakistanmail.com Reply-to: grumph@pakistanmail.com To: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Cc: torvalds@transmeta.com, hpa@zytor.com Date: Wed, 30 Jan 2002 18:09:22 +0100 Subject: Re: Wanted: Volunteer to code a Patchbot Message-id: <3c580adc.3d7c.0@pakistanmail.com> X-User-Info: 217.70.229.45 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org I did some thinking just before this thread surfaced. What can a patchbot be trusted to do properly? (see below) --------------------------------------------------- Linus got his style of working and he's got no intention whatsoever to change that. So what is needed is a bot that works according to Linus' taste, but goes behind his back when it comes to informing the poor patch submitters.... As always, simplicity rules. None of this relies on a bot handling actual patching of code in the tree. A live, human (most of you, I assume) being will have to review and manually apply the patch. None of this requires Linus to change his habits, he could still apply any patches sent to torvalds@transmeta. Trusted people could still send Linus patches directly. But the newbies and untrusted guys without an established relationship to a trusted kernel developer get a little help to keep their patch updated. It is not going to help on bad person chemistry or bad code. But it could weed out the obvious non-starters and help people get it right, without bothering busy kernel developers. What can a patchbot be trusted to do properly? --------------------------------------------------- - receive mail sent to: patch-2.5-linus@kernel or patch-2.4-marcelo@kernel (you get the idea; version and tree) - patch-id assignment for tracking of patches accepted by bot - sender authentication/confirmation, as for mailing list subscriptions - verify that patch - applies to latest tree - isn't oversized (by some definition) - is correctly formatted - contains a rationale (in some predefined format) - route patch to correct maintainer(s), based on the files it touches (may require some initial work) - inform sender that patch was forwarded to - inform sender that patch was automatically rejected because it: - does not apply to latest tree - is too big/touches too many files - does not compile (hardware reqs.? OSD labs?) - does not contain aforementioned rationale - isn't formatted according to CodingStyle (Does current code?) - inform sender that patch did not end up in next snap of tree, possibly because of: - conflict with other patch - a human didn't like the taste of it (-EBADTASTE) - maintainer has not reviewed the patch yet (use the above assigned patch-id to detect if patch was applied) - ask sender to rediff, review and resubmit patch The bot could do this by itself. But it isn't linus-style. The sender should maintain his own patch. - inform the sender how to kill a patch-id from being processed - automatically kill patch-ids from being processed if sender does not respond within