[pacman-dev] [PATCH] fix for incorrect checking of return code, which causes syntax errors

[Xavier Chantry]

On Sun, May 16, 2010 at 1:16 PM, Allan McRae <allan at archlinux.org> wrote:
> On 16/05/10 21:07, Dieter Plaetinck wrote:
>>
>> On Sun, 16 May 2010 10:13:46 +1000
>> Allan McRae<allan at archlinux.org>  wrote:
>>
>>> You should commit patches with "-s" so that you get the signoff line.
>>
>> aye! but i wonder what the relevancy of the signoff is. does it just
>> mean "i tested it and approve this change" ? that sort of is already
>> implicit since i submitted the patch, so the signoff just makes it
>> explicit? this would mean i have to commit -s in nearly all git
>> commits i do in my all projects.
>
> Ask Dan...   I assume he wrote the patch submitting guilelines:
> http://www.archlinux.org/pacman/submitting-patches.html
>
> Allan
>
>
>

From
http://git.kernel.org/?p=linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux-2.6.git;a=blob;f=Documentation/SubmittingPatches;hb=HEAD

12) Sign your work

To improve tracking of who did what, especially with patches that can
percolate to their final resting place in the kernel through several
layers of maintainers, we've introduced a "sign-off" procedure on
patches that are being emailed around.

The sign-off is a simple line at the end of the explanation for the
patch, which certifies that you wrote it or otherwise have the right to
pass it on as a open-source patch.  The rules are pretty simple: if you
can certify the below:

        Developer's Certificate of Origin 1.1

        By making a contribution to this project, I certify that:

        (a) The contribution was created in whole or in part by me and I
            have the right to submit it under the open source license
            indicated in the file; or

        (b) The contribution is based upon previous work that, to the best
            of my knowledge, is covered under an appropriate open source
            license and I have the right under that license to submit that
            work with modifications, whether created in whole or in part
            by me, under the same open source license (unless I am
            permitted to submit under a different license), as indicated
            in the file; or

        (c) The contribution was provided directly to me by some other
            person who certified (a), (b) or (c) and I have not modified
            it.

	(d) I understand and agree that this project and the contribution
	    are public and that a record of the contribution (including all
	    personal information I submit with it, including my sign-off) is
	    maintained indefinitely and may be redistributed consistent with
	    this project or the open source license(s) involved.

then you just add a line saying

	Signed-off-by: Random J Developer <random at developer.example.org>

using your real name (sorry, no pseudonyms or anonymous contributions.)

Some people also put extra tags at the end.  They'll just be ignored for
now, but you can do this to mark internal company procedures or just
point out some special detail about the sign-off.

If you are a subsystem or branch maintainer, sometimes you need to slightly
modify patches you receive in order to merge them, because the code is not
exactly the same in your tree and the submitters'. If you stick strictly to
rule (c), you should ask the submitter to rediff, but this is a totally
counter-productive waste of time and energy. Rule (b) allows you to adjust
the code, but then it is very impolite to change one submitter's code and
make him endorse your bugs. To solve this problem, it is recommended that
you add a line between the last Signed-off-by header and yours, indicating
the nature of your changes. While there is nothing mandatory about this, it
seems like prepending the description with your mail and/or name, all
enclosed in square brackets, is noticeable enough to make it obvious that
you are responsible for last-minute changes. Example :

	Signed-off-by: Random J Developer <random at developer.example.org>
	[lucky at maintainer.example.org: struct foo moved from foo.c to foo.h]
	Signed-off-by: Lucky K Maintainer <lucky at maintainer.example.org>

This practise is particularly helpful if you maintain a stable branch and
want at the same time to credit the author, track changes, merge the fix,
and protect the submitter from complaints. Note that under no circumstances
can you change the author's identity (the From header), as it is the one
which appears in the changelog.

Special note to back-porters: It seems to be a common and useful practise
to insert an indication of the origin of a patch at the top of the commit
message (just after the subject line) to facilitate tracking. For instance,
here's what we see in 2.6-stable :

    Date:   Tue May 13 19:10:30 2008 +0000

        SCSI: libiscsi regression in 2.6.25: fix nop timer handling

        commit 4cf1043593db6a337f10e006c23c69e5fc93e722 upstream

And here's what appears in 2.4 :

    Date:   Tue May 13 22:12:27 2008 +0200

        wireless, airo: waitbusy() won't delay

        [backport of 2.6 commit b7acbdfbd1f277c1eb23f344f899cfa4cd0bf36a]

Whatever the format, this information provides a valuable help to people
tracking your trees, and to people trying to trouble-shoot bugs in your
tree.