Re: [PATCH] docs: submitting-patches: Require base tree information

[Eric Biggers <ebiggers@kernel.org>]

On Thu, Oct 22, 2026 at 08:57:55AM +0200, Krzysztof Kozlowski wrote:
> On 21/10/2026 18:32, Laurent Pinchart wrote:
> > On Wed, Oct 21, 2026 at 01:55:37PM +0200, Krzysztof Kozlowski wrote:
> >>
> >>> there's no base-commit?  Including any historical patch (from
> >>> months/years ago), patches with dependencies, etc.
> >>
> >> Dependency is something else, but for every other patch:
> >> 1. For testing/CI: you apply on top of next
> >> 2. Every other case the maintainer knows where to apply it, because it
> >> is his HEAD of next-branch.
> >>
> >> I am repeating myself, but I really had no single problem of lack of
> >> knowledge where to apply a patch as a maintainer or reviewer of some
> >> subsystem, thus maybe I do not understand the actual problem you are
> >> experiencing.
> > 
> > When I review patches, I often need to apply them to a tree, mainly to
> > see the context, but sometimes also to test them. I have encountered
> > many cases where the patch wouldn't apply on the current for-next branch
> > of the relevant subsystem. That's often because the patch had
> > dependencies. When I'm lucky they are listed manually in the cover
> > letter with a link to a branch, but that's far from being the common
> > case. I then have to ask the submitter to provide a branch, or enough
> > information to recreate a branch. Having base information (base-commit,
> > prerequisite-patch-id, and possibly base-tree) would save me quite some
> > time.
> > 
> > I understand your concern about maintainers cherry-picking and sometimes
> > introducing issues as a result. In that case I also prefer asking the
> > submitter to rebase, retest, and resubmit. That's not what I want to use
> > base information for, in my case it helps with the review process.
> 
> That's valid and for 95% (guessing the number...) of cases will be
> solved by having linux-next as a base, thus requiring the base
> information is redundant. It's just linux-next.

linux-next changes every day, so "It's just linux-next" is ambiguous.

Without base-commit, the workaround ends up being to use the date the
patch was sent and various other information to try to guess a base
commit.  That's time-consuming and unreliable.

- Eric