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([187.94.15.112]) by smtp.gmail.com with ESMTPSA id a92af1059eb24-18314b1722asm25115638c88.1.2026.10.18.16.19.22 (version=TLS1_3 cipher=TLS_AES_256_GCM_SHA384 bits=256/256); Sun, 18 Oct 2026 16:19:25 -0700 (PDT) From: Breno Rodrigues Alves To: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Cc: Jonathan Corbet , Andy Whitcroft , Joe Perches , Dwaipayan Ray , Lukas Bulwahn Subject: Re: [RFC PATCH 0/7] scripts: convert seven more Perl utilities to Python Date: Sun, 18 Oct 2026 20:19:16 -0300 Message-ID: <20261018231917.74657-1-breno3011alves@gmail.com> X-Mailer: git-send-email 2.43.0 In-Reply-To: <87fqy2afnk.fsf@trenco.lwn.net> References: <87fqy2afnk.fsf@trenco.lwn.net> 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=UTF-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit > So an important part of describing any change is *why* you are doing it. > Why are you doing all of these conversions? Some of these scripts have > not seen changes in decades and are likely unused; why do we want to > mess with them now? You're right, and thanks for pushing on this — I should have framed the *why* in the cover letter. I ran a quick analysis of each script to separate what's actually used from what's likely dead code. Three groups: 1. Actively used by developers or build: - get_maintainer.pl: 28 references in Documentation/ alone. - recordmcount.pl: called from scripts/Makefile.build when CONFIG_FTRACE_MCOUNT_USE_RECORDMCOUNT is enabled. - generate_initcall_order.pl: called from scripts/Makefile.build when initcall tracing is enabled. 2. Used by developers, not integrated into the build: - leaking_addresses.pl: security-research tool run manually. 3. Likely obsolete: - checkdeclares.pl: no build, doc, or in-tree references. (Last-modified not verified locally — shallow clone — but no reference is the stronger signal.) - checkversion.pl: one reference in scripts/Makefile.build, but the check itself is narrow. - extract_xc3028.pl: no references; extracts firmware for DVB hardware unmaintained for over a decade. The honest conclusion is that group 3 is a removal candidate, not a conversion target. I did not do this analysis before v1 and I should have. Plan for v2: - Keep get_maintainer, recordmcount, generate_initcall_order, leaking_addresses. - Drop checkdeclares and extract_xc3028 from the series. - Decide checkversion separately (keep, or propose for removal after a public call for users). - Rewrite the cover letter to state the motivation explicitly. Broader motivation for the kept four: kernel CI and tooling already assume Python for kernel-doc, spdxcheck, bpf_doc. Keeping Perl alive solely for a handful of scripts forces two runtimes for the same class of tools. Converting the active ones closes that gap; converting dead ones does not. Breno