On 7/2/26 23:17, Boris Burkov wrote: > On Thu, Jul 02, 2026 at 05:50:15PM +0100, Lorenzo Stoakes wrote: >> On Thu, Jul 02, 2026 at 12:48:22PM -0400, Jeff Layton wrote: >>> >>> Do we need a tag for this though? >>> >>> This seems like the kind of information that we would always require in >>> the cover letter of a series (or the little place in an individual >>> patch for comments that don't get merged). That would also allow you to >>> convey a lot more nuance about how it was used. >>> >>> ISTM asking people to disclose LLM usage in a cover letter would give >>> everyone what they want: Information about whether and possibly how an >>> LLM was used, and it also wouldn't clutter up the changelogs with these >>> tags. >> >> It's much much clearer and easier to just have a standardised tag for that. >> >> You can see that (and grep for that) immediately, vague paragraphs not so >> much. >> > > At the risk of being pedantic on a point where I think the document is > kind of lacking: > > What level of assistance crosses the bar for an "Assisted-by: LLM" tag? > > Some sample levels of assistance to illustrate the point: > > 1. I used an llm to one-shot vibe-code a patch > 2. I used an llm to write a patch but carefully reviewed every line > 3. I used an llm to explore the design space for a patch but wrote it > manually > 4. I used an llm to debug or reproduce a kernel issue but then wrote the > fix manually after fully understanding the defect > 5. I used an llm to review a patch I wrote > 6. I used an llm to research some chunk of code while writing a patch > 7. I used Google while writing a patch and learned something valuable > from the AI overview at the top > > I personally would 100% use the tag for 1 or 2, and have already done > so. I have not been doing it for 3-5, as I think that will basically > make every patch llm-assisted to the point of the distinction being > meaningless. If we should be doing it for 3-5 (or some subset thereof) > then my mistake and I will certainly start doing so. I would hope most > people agree 6-7 and similar need no tag. > > Similar questions abound if you use an llm to help with writing the > English text in the patch or emails. > > I have a feeling that this ambiguity is part of the reason we aren't all > agreeing on the value of the tag?
Yes, I raised something similar as reply to Christian's RFC [1], where I said that for me the information *how* it was used is much more important: " Assisted-by: LLM # translate commit message Assisted-by: LLM # generate some test cases Assisted-by: LLM # cleanup logic Assisted-by: LLM # everything and I have no clue what any in here does " That tag is it stands is pretty useless, really. I assume most people only really use it for something in-between 1 and 2, but *who knows*. [1] https://lore.kernel.org/r/[email protected] -- Cheers, David
