Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S932737AbZJFOVL (ORCPT ); Tue, 6 Oct 2009 10:21:11 -0400 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S932697AbZJFOVK (ORCPT ); Tue, 6 Oct 2009 10:21:10 -0400 Received: from smtp1.linux-foundation.org ([140.211.169.13]:34071 "EHLO smtp1.linux-foundation.org" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S932689AbZJFOVJ (ORCPT ); Tue, 6 Oct 2009 10:21:09 -0400 Date: Tue, 6 Oct 2009 07:18:52 -0700 (PDT) From: Linus Torvalds X-X-Sender: torvalds@localhost.localdomain To: Dirk Hohndel cc: Len Brown , Linux Kernel Mailing List Subject: Re: Linux 2.6.32-rc3 In-Reply-To: <1254797502.14122.146.camel@dhohndel-mobl.amr.corp.intel.com> Message-ID: References: <1254797502.14122.146.camel@dhohndel-mobl.amr.corp.intel.com> User-Agent: Alpine 2.01 (LFD 1184 2008-12-16) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org List-ID: X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Content-Length: 2556 Lines: 62 On Mon, 5 Oct 2009, Dirk Hohndel wrote: > On Mon, 2009-10-05 at 21:57 -0400, Len Brown wrote: > > > This could be clarified if you update Makefile on the 1st commit > > after 2.6.X is frozen to simply be 2.6.Y-merge or 2.6.Y-rc0 > > or something. Anything but 2.6.X. > > I have seen this request many times and it seems to make perfect sense. No. It makes perfect sense just because the people who think so don't think things through. It doesn't help, for several reasons: - the step function of the Makefile change happens once per release, and if you compile anything but releases, you can never rely on just the revision. Was it a plain -rc, a plain release, or something in between? You'll never know, just looking at the 2.6.x.y thing. In other words, you fundamentally have three choices: (a) be confused. Adding an "-rc0" won't help. You'll still be confused in between releases about exactly what you're running. (b) use CONFIG_LOCALVERSION_AUTO=y Now, if 'uname -r' says 2.6.31, then you _know_ it's exactly 2.6.31 and nothing else. If it's a few commits after 2.6.31, it will say something like '2.6.31-1-g752015d', and you know that it's one commit after 2.6.31, and you'll know _which_ commit it is! (c) Don't compile anything but releases. Those are the choices. - An even _more_ fundamental reason: Linux development isn't linear. There is not one "first commit" after a release, and there never will be. Sure, there's a first commit that I do, but that has absolutely zero relevance. Learn this. Until you do, you'll be confused, and you'll show your confusion by saying "I want a 2.6.n+1-rc0". You'll _also_ show your confusion by things like "I was bisecting a bug that happened between 2.6.30 and 2.6.31, and suddenly git was asking me to test a kernel that said it was version 2.6.29-rc1 - so I stopped bisecting because git was confused". Who was confused? Was it git, or was it the person who thought that the Makefile version could be consistent in a non-linear world? So no. I'm not going to do -rc0. Because doing that is _stupid_. And until you understand _why_ it's stupid, it's pointless talking about it, and when you _do_ understand that it's stupid, you'll agree with me. Linus -- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/