Re: [PATCH] MAINTAINERS: exclude char maintainers from things they do not maintain

From: Joe Perches
Date: Thu Oct 01 2020 - 02:41:15 EST


On Thu, 2020-10-01 at 08:29 +0200, Greg Kroah-Hartman wrote:
> On Wed, Sep 30, 2020 at 01:02:46PM -0700, Joe Perches wrote:
> > On Wed, 2020-09-30 at 18:28 +0200, Greg Kroah-Hartman wrote:
> > > On Wed, Sep 30, 2020 at 08:36:56AM -0500, Corey Minyard wrote:
> > > > On Wed, Sep 30, 2020 at 02:10:07PM +0200, Greg Kroah-Hartman wrote:
> > > > > There are a number of subdirectories and files in drivers/char/ that
> > > > > have their own maintainers and developers and ways of getting patches to
> > > > > Linus. This includes random.c, IPMI, hardware random drivers, TPM
> > > > > drivers, and agp drivers. Instead of sending those patches to Arnd and
> > > > > myself, who can't do anything with them, send them to the proper
> > > > > developers instead.
[]
> > Your exclusion list is:
> >
> > +X: drivers/char/agp/
> > +X: drivers/char/hw_random/
> > +X: drivers/char/ipmi/
> > +X: drivers/char/random.c
> > +X: drivers/char/tpm/
> >
> > But the current subdirectories of drivers/char are:
> >
> > drivers/char/agp
> > drivers/char/hw_random
> > drivers/char/ipmi
> > drivers/char/mwave
> > drivers/char/pcmcia
> > drivers/char/tpm
> > drivers/char/tpm/eventlog
> > drivers/char/tpm/st33zp24
> > drivers/char/xilinx_hwicap
> > drivers/char/xillybus
> >
> > do you want to specifically maintain any of them?
>
> Yes, the other ones we do maintain.
>
> > Wouldn't it be easier to add a single subdirectory exclusion
> > and add specific inclusions for subdirectories you actually
> > do want to maintain>
> >
> >
> > X: drivers/char/*/
> > F: drivers/char/<whatever>
>
> If we do that, it will be one extra line in the MAINTAINERS file, as we
> are dealing with 4 we want, and 4 we don't :)
>
> I like being explicit as to what we do NOT want to review, it's easier
> to see when glancing at the file.

No worries, it just wasn't obvious that all the other
directories were ones you actually want to maintain.

btw: xillybus nominally has its own maintainer too.

XILLYBUS DRIVER
M: Eli Billauer <eli.billauer@xxxxxxxxx>
L: linux-kernel@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
S: Supported
F: drivers/char/xillybus/

cheers, Joe