Conversation
kernellogger@fosstodon.org

Thorsten Leemhuis (acct. 1/4)

regressions only reported after a long time[1] will be handled as bugs (IOW: the "no regressions" rule does not really apply any more), as this recent mail from Linus shows:

https://lore.kernel.org/all/CAHk-%3DwgFuoHpMk_Z_R3qMXVDgq0N1592%2BbABkyGjwwSL4zBtHA@mail.gmail.com/

[1] How long? Not sure, in the end that's up to Linus. But from an earlier mail of him I guess it everything found after more that a year might become problematic:

https://lore.kernel.org/all/CAHk-=wis_qQy4oDNynNKi5b7Qhosmxtoj1jxo5wmB6SRUwQUBQ@mail.gmail.com/

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kernellogger@fosstodon.org

Thorsten Leemhuis (acct. 1/4)

Reply to

@penguingeek

https://docs.kernel.org/admin-guide/reporting-regressions.html

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krzk

Krzysztof Kozlowski

Reply to @kernellogger@fosstodon.org
@kernellogger Linus expressed few times that if something was broken for very long time, was not working for long time, it should not be treated as urgent/important fix thus should not go to current RC cycle. Instead, should go via normal development branch, so for the next merge window. I know that stable folks have different point of view - they also expressed it.

I personally follow exactly the same approach in handling fixes: if something was broken for long time, it is regular bugfix thus goes to "for-next" branch, not "fixes / for-linus / for-current-rc".

Now, if a regression was unnoticed for 8 years, it kinda fits above criteria.
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kernellogger@fosstodon.org

Thorsten Leemhuis (acct. 1/4)

Reply to @krzk

@krzk

yeah, I'm aware of it; but I think I'd classify them in three different categories:

* recent regressions (~past year): devs are obliged to fix, ideally through fixes/for-linus/for-current-rc

* older regression (~one to two or three years?): devs are obliged to fix, ideally in the next merge window if timing permits

* anything older: treat it like any other bug

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kernellogger@fosstodon.org

Thorsten Leemhuis (acct. 1/4)

Reply to @kernellogger@fosstodon.org
Edited 7 months ago

@krzk

and wrt. to stable:

the "# after X weeks in mainline" (X=4 or 6 or something) option could reduce the pain[1], but that is bound to the stable tag; and we lack a "nostable" tag, too[2]. 🥴

[1] https://docs.kernel.org/process/stable-kernel-rules.html

[EDIT]
[2] maybe we could introduce

Cc: <stable@vger.kernel.org>

or something like that to make "do not backport" obvious

[/EDIT]

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krzk

Krzysztof Kozlowski

Reply to @kernellogger@fosstodon.org
@kernellogger That's reasonable classification. Some kernel users also need some time to take new kernel release, thus actual tests and results might be coming 1-2 years after a release.
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krzk

Krzysztof Kozlowski

Reply to @kernellogger@fosstodon.org
@kernellogger Oh, interesting, I did not know about the "delay" argument. The no-stable is so far a bit per subsystem. Some of them, like I think netdev, rely on marking things explicitly cc-stable. Most don't care thus anything with Fixes tag is picked up.
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kernellogger@fosstodon.org

Thorsten Leemhuis (acct. 1/4)

Reply to @krzk

@krzk

Those "no-stable" subsystems are listed here:

https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/stable-queue.git/tree/ignore_list?id=9bf1f8f1ca9ae53cf3bc8781e4efdb6ebaee70db

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