On Thu, Nov 08, 2018 at 08:58:32PM +0100, Thomas Gleixner wrote: > On Thu, 8 Nov 2018, Paul E. McKenney wrote: > > On Thu, Nov 08, 2018 at 09:19:33AM -0800, Dan Williams wrote: > > > On Thu, Nov 8, 2018 at 1:13 AM Peter Zijlstra <pet...@infradead.org> > > > wrote: > > > > > > > > On Thu, Nov 08, 2018 at 08:40:12AM +0100, Ingo Molnar wrote: > > > > > > + - Cc: ``cc-ed-person <person@mail>`` > > > > > > + > > > > > > + If the patch should be backported to stable, then please add a > > > > > > '``Cc: > > > > > > + sta...@vger.kernel.org``' tag, but do not Cc stable when > > > > > > sending your > > > > > > + mail. > > > > > > > > > > Can I suggest a more canonical form: > > > > > > > > > > Cc: <sta...@vger.kernel.org> # v4.18 and later kernels > > > > > > > > > > It would be nice if people adding Cc: stable lines would actually try > > > > > to > > > > > figure out which exact kernel versions are affected. > > > > > > I know at least StGit mail does not grok that "#"notation. I've > > > stopped using it in favor of a "Fixes:" tag. I would think "Fixes:" is > > > preferred over "# <KVER>" if only because it can be used to track > > > fixes to commits that have been backported to stable. Is there any > > > reason for "# <KVER>" to continue in a world where we have "Fixes:"? > > > > I sometimes have fixes that need to be different for different past > > releases. And there have been cases where RCU patches would apply and > > build cleanly against releases for which it was not appropriate, but > > would have some low-probability failure. Which meant that it could be > > expected to pass light testing. :-/ > > > > So I sometimes need a way of saying which versions a given patch applies > > to, independent of the version into which the bug was introduced. > > I can understand that you want to limit the scope of automatic backports. > > But we really should try to always use of the Fixes: tag. In most cases the > SHA1 of the commit in the fixes tag defines the backport scope. > > For the rare cases where the buggy commit is really old, but you want to > limit the backport scope for a reason then I really like to avoid to > overload the Cc stable tag and have a dedicated tag instead. Something > like: > > Fixes: 1234567890AB ("subsys/comp: Short summary") > Backport-to: 4.14 > > and have that backport tag right under the Fixes tag. If the Backport-to > tag is ommitted, the SHA1 defines the scope, but I'm fine with making it > mandatory. > > If there is really the special RCU case where each and every stable version > needs some special treatment then say: > > Backport-to: Manual > > or whatever sensible word would express it correctly. > > The Fixes tag is really valuable when you need to make connections and I > know that the people who are looking into safety-critical Linux value the > tag because it can be used for tracking and for metrics.
Indeed, I do need to get my act together with the Fixes tag. And I am happy with whatever format would limit backports appropriately. Thanx, Paul