On 24 September 2026 14:49:45 BST, Sasha Levin <[email protected]> wrote: >Most coding agents have standardized on AGENTS.md as the file they load >automatically from the root of a repository. README already tells AI >tools to read and follow Documentation/process/coding-assistants.rst, >but that only helps if the agent decides to read README before acting, >which in practice it often doesn't. > >Add a top-level AGENTS.md symlink to README, so agents load it on their >own and follow its pointer to the AI guidelines. This keeps a single >entry point for every reader, and avoids adding a separate copy of the >policy that could drift from the RST. > >As an example, two different agents were asked to "create a new commit >renaming the release (in the Makefile) to AI Test". > >Without AGENTS.md, the first agent added a Signed-off-by for the user on >its own. It should never have done that: only the human submitter can >certify the Developer Certificate of Origin, after reviewing the change. >It also used its own attribution tag instead of Assisted-by: > >> Makefile: rename release to AI Test >> >> Co-Authored-By: <model name> <noreply@...> >> Signed-off-by: Sasha Levin <[email protected]> > >The second agent added no attribution at all: > >> Rename release to AI Test > >With AGENTS.md in place, neither agent added a Signed-off-by, and both >used the Assisted-by tag. README itself mentions neither tag, so both >agents followed its pointer to coding-assistants.rst: > >> Makefile: rename release to "AI Test" >> >> Change the release name from "Baby Opossum Posse" to "AI Test". >> >> Assisted-by: LLM > >> Makefile: rename release to AI Test >> >> Assisted-by: LLM > >Both agents also followed the kernel's general guidelines more closely. >The second agent's subject gained the "subsystem: summary phrase" form >that submitting-patches.rst asks for, instead of a bare "Rename release >to AI Test", and the first agent added a body describing the change. > >Assisted-by: LLM >Signed-off-by: Sasha Levin <[email protected]>
NAK, we could add to memories that to read soandso file before every patch, and then it wouldn't increase tokens then? >--- > AGENTS.md | 1 + > 1 file changed, 1 insertion(+) > create mode 120000 AGENTS.md > >diff --git a/AGENTS.md b/AGENTS.md >new file mode 120000 >index 0000000000000..100b93820ade4 >--- /dev/null >+++ b/AGENTS.md >@@ -0,0 +1 @@ >+README >\ No newline at end of file > --- Thanks! "I'm not a very positive person" - Linus torvalds
