Re: [PATCH] Documentation/process: Add text to indicate supporters should be mailed

[Bryan O'Donoghue]

On 28/09/2022 13:02, Thorsten Leemhuis wrote:
> On 28.09.22 13:48, Bryan O'Donoghue wrote:
> > On 28/09/2022 05:34, Thorsten Leemhuis wrote:
> > > On 28.09.22 02:30, Bryan O'Donoghue wrote:
> > > > Recently when submitting a yaml change I found that I had omitted the
> > > > maintainer whose tree the change needed to go through.
> > > >
> > > > The reason for that is the path in MAINTAINERS is marked as Supported
> > > > not
> > > > Maintained. Reading MAINTAINERS we see quote:
> > > >
> > > >              Supported:   Someone is actually paid to look after this.
> > > >              Maintained:  Someone actually looks after it.
> > > >
> > > > The current submitting-patches.rst only says to mail maintainers
> > > > though not
> > > > supporters. When we run scripts/get_maintainer.pl anybody who is
> > > > denoted a
> > > > paid maintainer will appear as a supporter.
> > > >
> > > > Let's add some text to the submitting-patches.rst to indicate that
> > > > supporters should similarly be mailed so that you can't do as I did and
> > > > mail every maintainer get_maintainer.pl tells you to, without actually
> > > > mailing the one supporter you need to.
> > [...]
> > > Which leads to two other question: Are there any other places that might
> > > benefit from such a clarification? Or would it be even make sense to
> > > change the format of MAINTAINERS to avoid the problem in the first
> > > place? Maybe something like "Maintained(v)" (Someone volunteered to look
> > > after it in spare hours.) and "Maintained(p)" (Someone is actually paid
> > > to look after this.). Ahh, no, that doesn't look good. But you get the
> > > idea.
> >
> > We could update get_maintainer to print out something else
> > such as
>
> I really like the idea of just changing get_maintainer, but also...
>
> > scripts/get_maintainer.pl
> > Documentation/devicetree/bindings/mfd/qcom,spmi-pmic.yaml
> >
> > Andy Gross <agross@xxxxxxxxxx> (maintainer:ARM/QUALCOMM SUPPORT)
> > Bjorn Andersson <bjorn.andersson@xxxxxxxxxx> (maintainer:ARM/QUALCOMM
> > SUPPORT)
> > Konrad Dybcio <konrad.dybcio@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> (reviewer:ARM/QUALCOMM
> > SUPPORT)
> > Lee Jones <lee@xxxxxxxxxx> (maintainer-supporter:MULTIFUNCTION DEVICES
> > (MFD))
> >
> > or say
> >
> > scripts/get_maintainer.pl
> > Documentation/devicetree/bindings/mfd/qcom,spmi-pmic.yaml
> > Andy Gross <agross@xxxxxxxxxx> (maintainer:ARM/QUALCOMM SUPPORT)
> > Bjorn Andersson <bjorn.andersson@xxxxxxxxxx> (maintainer:ARM/QUALCOMM
> > SUPPORT)
> > Konrad Dybcio <konrad.dybcio@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> (reviewer:ARM/QUALCOMM
> > SUPPORT)
> > Lee Jones <lee@xxxxxxxxxx> (supporting-maintainer:MULTIFUNCTION DEVICES
> > (MFD))
> >
> > it would be less churn but, I still think we would need to update the
> > documentation to be very explicit that "supporting-maintainer or
> > maintainer" needs to be emailed with your patch so that sufficiently
> > talented idiots such as myself, know who to mail.
> >
> > Although thinking about it we would be introducing yet another term
> > "supporting-maintainer" to which people would say "what is that"
>
> ...agree with this.
>
> > Feels a little less confusing to me to leave supporter as-is and just
> > document expectations for patch submission better.
>
> Hmm, how about this:
>
> scripts/get_maintainer.pl
> Documentation/devicetree/bindings/mfd/qcom,spmi-pmic.yaml
> Lee Jones <lee@xxxxxxxxxx> (maintainer[supported]:MULTIFUNCTION DEVICES
> (MFD))
> Andy Gross <agross@xxxxxxxxxx> (maintainer[volunteer]:ARM/QUALCOMM SUPPORT)
> Bjorn Andersson <bjorn.andersson@xxxxxxxxxx>
> (maintainer[volunteer]:ARM/QUALCOMM SUPPORT)
> Konrad Dybcio <konrad.dybcio@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> (reviewer:ARM/QUALCOMM SUPPORT)
>
> Not totally sure about this myself. And there is a risk that any such
> change might break scripts that rely on the current approach used by
> scripts/get_maintainer.pl :-/

So it feels to me like the right thing to do is change get_maintainer 
and accompanying documentation but, I'll wait to hear back from Jonathan.

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bod