From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S1753601AbdGULkS (ORCPT ); Fri, 21 Jul 2017 07:40:18 -0400 Received: from mail-wm0-f68.google.com ([74.125.82.68]:34885 "EHLO mail-wm0-f68.google.com" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1750762AbdGULkE (ORCPT ); Fri, 21 Jul 2017 07:40:04 -0400 To: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org, torvalds@linux-foundation.org From: Ian Molton Subject: Problematic culture around Signed-off-by Message-ID: Date: Fri, 21 Jul 2017 12:40:02 +0100 User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux x86_64; rv:52.0) Gecko/20100101 Thunderbird/52.2.1 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=windows-1252 Content-Language: en-US Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org List-ID: X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Hi folks, I've been away from kernel development for a bit, but I've returned and I'm troubled by what seems to be an entrenched and widespread (IMO) misuse of the "Signed-off-by:" in commits. I've now either been asked to sign off RFC quality patches "because its quicker" on more than one occasion in the last week or so, and I've seen others signing off code which clearly has no hope of going anywhere near the kernel. (eg. // commented out lines) I was of the impression that Signed-off-by: was intended to be used on essentially *finished* commits, indicating both readiness for inclusion upstream and ones ownership of the copyright. Even if the intent is *purely* a copyright isue, Signing off *everything* surely makes it far too easy for people to get junk into the kernel. I've actually been deliberately NOT signing off my code because I *DONT* want it surreptitiously applied with my name on it unless its 100% spot on. WTH is going on? How can we fix this? Is Signed-off-by: a lost cause for code quality? Do we need to add a Ready-for-mainline: {yes,no} field as well? Have I just missed something? Maybe I'm just in a minority here? Whats going on? -Ian