On 6 Feb 2019, at 21:08, Matthew Knepley via petsc-dev <petsc-dev@mcs.anl.gov<mailto:petsc-dev@mcs.anl.gov>> wrote:
On Wed, Feb 6, 2019 at 3:03 PM Dave May via petsc-dev <petsc-dev@mcs.anl.gov<mailto:petsc-dev@mcs.anl.gov>> wrote: * I notice that most man pages will say Collective on <type> e.g. https://www.mcs.anl.gov/petsc/petsc-current/docs/manualpages/DMDA/DMDACreate.html * Some others say Collective on <implementation-name> e.g. https://www.mcs.anl.gov/petsc/petsc-current/docs/manualpages/DMDA/DMDACreateNaturalVector.html or https://www.mcs.anl.gov/petsc/petsc-current/docs/manualpages/DM/DMCompositeAddDM.html In the former, at least the word "DMDA" gets linked back to the implementation, whilst in the latter "DMComposite" does not. Should "Collective on <implementation-name>" be avoided? It is potentially somewhat unclear given that the name of the implementation does not appear anywhere in the arg list (type or variable name). That said, "collective on <type>" could be similarly criticized if a method existed with two args of the same type. * Many of the methods in this file www.mcs.anl.gov/petsc/petsc-current/src/dm/impls/shell/dmshell.c.html<http://www.mcs.anl.gov/petsc/petsc-current/src/dm/impls/shell/dmshell.c.html> simply say "Collective" (without a type or implementation name), or they say "Logically Collective on XXX" I do realize that there is a pattern that the statement "collective on xxx" or "not collective" applies (implicitly) to the first argument of any PETSc function call (at least that I've come across) so possibly just indicating the method as "Collective" might suffice (assuming (i) there is a pattern and (ii) everyone knows about the pattern). Q: Should I make a PR to unify these man pages (and any others I spot) to just say "Collective on <type>"? This has always bugged me. It should say, I think, 'Collective on <arg name>", or "Logically collective on <arg name>". +1 I also think it's a property of the concrete argument and not the class. But it would be an epic task to rewrite it everywhere. Vaclav Thanks, Matt Thanks, Dave -- What most experimenters take for granted before they begin their experiments is infinitely more interesting than any results to which their experiments lead. -- Norbert Wiener https://www.cse.buffalo.edu/~knepley/<http://www.cse.buffalo.edu/~knepley/>
