Re: Patchwork for glibc?

[Ramana Radhakrishnan <ramana dot gcc at googlemail dot com>]

On Fri, Feb 14, 2014 at 8:31 PM, David Miller <davem@davemloft.net> wrote:
> From: Ramana Radhakrishnan <ramana.gcc@googlemail.com>
> Date: Fri, 14 Feb 2014 19:14:22 +0000
>
>> What I don't like is this admin aspect for patches and reviews for
>> each project - that's effectively one person doing admin stuff per
>> project and I think developers doing this admin stuff regularly is
>> just a waste of their time.
>
> In practice, patchwork allows me to review and fully clasify hundreds
> of patches per day for the Linux kernel networking.  I've been using
> the tool every single day for years.
>

Fair enough and good to know.

> If you use the tool properly, it is not a time sink to classify the
> patches at all.  Most of my time is spent reading the patch and the
> threads of discussion attached to the patches, as it should be.
>
> I think it is misguided to suggest that it is an improvement to have
> the tool integrated somehow into the version control system and
> automatically update the disposition of the patch when a commit
> happens.

Maybe but ....

>
> Rather, I think you really want to bring up the entry on the patchwork
> page so you can read the whole thread of discussion, making sure you
> didn't miss anything.  And then, decide to apply or not apply the
> patch, and since you have the patchwork page open for that patch
> already, you can re-classify it as you close the web browser window.
>

I agree that being able to see the entire discussion on patchwork is
useful. I would expect the same from any other patch review interface.
I read the above as being the reviewer doing this through the
patchwork interface and not doing this just over email. Thus patches
which are reviewed through the web interface would possibly get their
statuses updated, but there may be a challenge to getting this right
with reviews that happen only over email.

There are times when I'd like to be able to start with patches that
are waiting for my attention and having the interface "cluttered" with
patches that I'm currently not interested in would be something I
wouldn't prefer to do. Is there an easy way to do that in patchwork
other than manually skimming through the patches list and creating
bundles would you know if there is an easy way to be "delegated" a
patch in patchwork or for the "delegation" to be assumed with the
email address you are CC'd on the patch with ?

> You can do this for groups of patches using bundles.  So one click
> can update the classification of arbitrary numbers of patches.
>
> If commits automatically make patchwork statuses update, mistakes will
> happen, things will be missed, and overall things will work worse.

I am worried about that working correctly in the absence of everyone
wanting to use the web interface which is why I thought that the web
interface would get very cluttered.

>
> It is absolutely not a waste of time for someone to be doing this work
> to carefully make sure each patch is considered properly, with
> discussion context et al., rather than some automated process
> bypassing all of this.
>
> We maintain carefully a list of people who have commit rights, and
> likewise we can carefully maintain a list of people who can admin
> the glibc patchwork group.
>

Valid points but I'd like to see how it works in practice.

> It's going to be a massive step forward from what is happening right
> now in glibc land.
>

It may well be. All of this will require some small changes in the way
in which people work. I look forward to seeing and hearing about how
this works in practice and scales with reviewers and developers.

regards
Ramana