kernel pre-emption and software speech

Henrik Nilsen Omma henrik at ubuntu.com
Wed Oct 4 11:39:38 EDT 2006


Samuel Thibault wrote:
> Hi,
>
> Justin Ekis, le Wed 04 Oct 2006 10:39:41 -0400, a écrit :
>   
>> Considering all that, and the fact that speakup seems to be very
>> stable, I think this message is overly harsh but I'm pasting it below
>> anyway.
>>     
>
> Mmm, it is not.  Really.  "Working" code doesn't mean "acceptable"
> code.  Linux can't accept code which doesn't follow a certain guideline.
> Adrian Bunk was kind enough to enumerate the issues to be resolved, and
> I do agree on all of them.  This is not being harsh, this is requiring
> good code quality.  Else Linux wouldn't be so successful.
>   

Right, the kernel esp. needs to be quite fuzzy about such stuff. It's a 
bit like approaching the High Priests about making changes in their holy 
book. It's the people presenting new code that have to make the case 
that it's good quality and useful. We know that to generally be the case 
but we have to sell it to the core kernel developers. It can be a long 
process, but the feedback is generally fair (if you keep the high 
standards of quality in mind) but it may be a bit direct, so thick skin 
is useful.

I would say it's very worth while though, because it will tighten up the 
code and there will be many more people looking at it making sure it 
works well together with their stuff too. And then of course it gets a 
much wider distribution.

I just spoke with Ben Collins who did the integration with our kernel. 
He says it was pretty straight forward to do, though he didn't look at 
coding style as such. He also says hosting it in git would make his work 
easier, and I suspect that of the core kernel devs too.

Henrik




More information about the Speakup mailing list