From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Received: from relay.hostedemail.com (smtprelay0017.hostedemail.com [216.40.44.17]) (using TLSv1.2 with cipher ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384 (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by smtp.subspace.kernel.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id D663623741 for ; Tue, 30 Dec 2025 00:19:22 +0000 (UTC) Authentication-Results: smtp.subspace.kernel.org; arc=none smtp.client-ip=216.40.44.17 ARC-Seal:i=1; a=rsa-sha256; d=subspace.kernel.org; s=arc-20240116; t=1767053965; cv=none; b=FZtlDPD5sr6kFK0tNKmHDQDYBQpQ+4u/UAaZ1poCoozfaedZbMy2sYX8rREIz9X2NZvS+ExJhQaBwtACn6h2ChJtJ4kk8hJ3fmKbt0fI+zDZMVYfCm1OQcaQAlCi7d3uz2PxFClTvWz0cB0nK7Z1+fUF9N2/d4gTdgeU6p3P0DU= ARC-Message-Signature:i=1; a=rsa-sha256; d=subspace.kernel.org; s=arc-20240116; t=1767053965; c=relaxed/simple; bh=uUXczdxFI6dY1KwTFtnqYkO4Cuk8lAB2wQeTN9jhQXs=; h=Date:From:To:Cc:Subject:Message-ID:In-Reply-To:References: MIME-Version:Content-Type; b=SCkFC2IMwMrFVwrxe9dRWVsU43iQ3QzAgMQrP5wlPU1Tb9K+TaV3lXSYBwSSeUpvzJ3Rh11NB0zLoc4XdAt5x+dQaTWKICl6CZYjtXhM3xkeyVbhdZFmgdmbLTdmbS+3gUq9kROSSWyz0+ybisB3VoiYcXVRmSUSFdv06OjaHNY= ARC-Authentication-Results:i=1; smtp.subspace.kernel.org; dmarc=pass (p=none dis=none) header.from=goodmis.org; spf=pass smtp.mailfrom=goodmis.org; arc=none smtp.client-ip=216.40.44.17 Authentication-Results: smtp.subspace.kernel.org; dmarc=pass (p=none dis=none) header.from=goodmis.org Authentication-Results: smtp.subspace.kernel.org; spf=pass smtp.mailfrom=goodmis.org Received: from omf04.hostedemail.com (a10.router.float.18 [10.200.18.1]) by unirelay10.hostedemail.com (Postfix) with ESMTP id 82194C3DEE; Tue, 30 Dec 2025 00:19:20 +0000 (UTC) Received: from [HIDDEN] (Authenticated sender: rostedt@goodmis.org) by omf04.hostedemail.com (Postfix) with ESMTPA id 6B23D20027; Tue, 30 Dec 2025 00:19:17 +0000 (UTC) Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2025 19:19:23 -0500 From: Steven Rostedt To: "Theodore Tso" Cc: "Paul E. McKenney" , "Dr. David Alan Gilbert" , Julia Lawall , Sasha Levin , Gabriele Paoloni , Kate Stewart , Chuck Wolber , Dmitry Vyukov , Mark Rutland , Thomas Gleixner , Lorenzo Stoakes , Shuah Khan , Chris Mason , linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Subject: Re: Follow-up on Linux-kernel code accessibility Message-ID: <20251229191923.2bac0c50@gandalf.local.home> In-Reply-To: <20251229235010.GA83368@macsyma.local> References: <8005c35a-d8dc-4908-93e5-46bd206f0139@paulmck-laptop> <435c7085-34e-16e9-5711-e53aa54cf4fc@inria.fr> <20251229104005.18b25def@gandalf.local.home> <7f10c583-4d95-432e-a536-898c79b1766d@paulmck-laptop> <20251229235010.GA83368@macsyma.local> X-Mailer: Claws Mail 3.20.0git84 (GTK+ 2.24.33; x86_64-pc-linux-gnu) Precedence: bulk X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org List-Id: List-Subscribe: List-Unsubscribe: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Rspamd-Server: rspamout06 X-Rspamd-Queue-Id: 6B23D20027 X-Stat-Signature: 1ti1w9bdymrbdx5pprgxhocdowy87xoe X-Session-Marker: 726F737465647440676F6F646D69732E6F7267 X-Session-ID: U2FsdGVkX191fgE7uwD7xqOmNhrWH+OhFuEj667IZUo= X-HE-Tag: 1767053957-233628 X-HE-Meta: U2FsdGVkX1/ZX7leL1NpydiuTbX5qzNFFuPo9GT7/VXeNoP6N8KLvzdPtDYl82NUBoV0v40K3UIixK0yk7mqBuBXrv5BPgoh7YmkBW/dZiossDpnP2YXIpRIyeYZfFVbD4YtfOzYvAZFAevqUY4ME/R6Rsbcz/j+pt/6DXlgM+lwpCb1R9gkQwEJPDaFFhxkcF6nDEGnWVpQVu1LVAgWpH7/24L//u1YR/9ImGMdguH71CuXwYybjKUJOqZ2gM+Q26vh4AvZJkhyjDnVvRIzMA7FHb5np759IISVQL2xFav43Y0bBdYjPKy44kzXwWI4 On Mon, 29 Dec 2025 18:50:10 -0500 "Theodore Tso" wrote: > Yes, it would be good if there were more than one person who can > understand the details of the code and who can maintain it, so we > don't have teh bus factor == 1 problem. But the fact remains that are > many parts of the kernel that I will freely admit that I have no > *clue* how it work, and that's OK. I'm sure if I spent a few weeks > deeply meditating on the code, I could eventually figure it out --- > but I don't have that kind of spare time. Nor am I someone who is > going to insist on a lot of documentation of internal details, since I > happen to believe, like you, that accessibility to *users* of RCU is > more important that people who are curious about the internal details > about why we are dividing by 3, and not 4 (and 5 is right out) :-) Do we care about reviewers? I keep hearing at every maintainer's summit and what not that we don't have enough reviewers. Well if it takes weeks to sit down and gork at code to be able to have a quality review, then yeah, we are not going to have any reviewers. RCU is one of the core infrastructures of the kernel. If it is wrong, then bad things can happen. I would think we would want as many people as possible to be able to understand how it works. I'm listed as one of the RCU reviewers because I spent a lot of time a few years back trying very hard to understand all the code. But things have changed a lot since I did that and when I go back now, I have no clue to how the simplest things work there anymore and I give up. I am Cc'd on a lot of the RCU code, and start looking at it when I can, but it usually comes in batches of 10-40 patches at a time. I can look at 10, but when it gets more than that, I simply don't have the time anymore to keep up. I guess I should just remove my name as a reviewer. -- Steve