[ewg] EWG/OFED meeting minutes for today (Dec 13, 2011)

[Vladimir Sokolovsky]

On 12/29/2011 05:21 PM, Steve Wise wrote:
> On 12/22/2011 02:26 PM, Edward Mascarenhas wrote:
>>> There is a suggestion from Eduard from Qlogic to have the backports ad different branches and not as today.
>>> He will start a mail thread on his suggestion.
>>
>> The attached file in pdf format has the proposal. It is also inlined in
>> text below so its easier to comment on. The pdf has 2 diagrams which
>> should make it easier to understand the changes that are proposed.
>>
>> Comments are welcome.
>>
>> - Edward
>
> I like this approach. I would also do the same thing with kernel_addons so that each branch is just a specific backport.
>
> What are there any disadvantages to your proposal?
>
> Did you get a chance to investigate the other backport projects from this thread? https://lkml.org/lkml/2011/9/9/327
>
> Steve.
>

Hi Edward,
The main disadvantage of this proposal is that it will require much more time for the maintenance, which is a show stopper, IMHO:
Any update in the main tree will require to checkout every branch with backports and make specific changes.
In addition, a lot of backports can be shared by the different kernels/Distros and it is easily maintainable today. The suggested approach will lead to
spending more work on backports as they will be developed separately.

Regarding the issues you bring in your proposal, there is a mechanism that enables to check that all patches can be applied clearly (ofed_scripts/ofed_makedist.sh) and a build script that checks the 
compilation on the OFA server.
Also, ofed_makedist.sh creates a tarball per backport directory which make it easier to test/develop for this specific kernel.
Each developer should check his code using these tools before sending a pull request.

Also, there is something unclear to me with the suggested approach: How the source tarball, included in the OFED, will look like?

Currently, I am investigating the "compat" backport project (https://lkml.org/lkml/2011/9/9/327). Probably, we should go in this direction.

Regards,
Vladimir