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| author | Paul Jackson <pj@sgi.com> | 2005-10-03 00:29:10 -0700 |
|---|---|---|
| committer | Linus Torvalds <torvalds@g5.osdl.org> | 2005-10-03 08:06:42 -0700 |
| commit | d6b9acc0c6c4a7c5d484d15271a5274656d0864f (patch) | |
| tree | 845765e077d9d436f1f2e7d57b9fe0e32a9e679a | |
| parent | c77054e518d9163578cfcad09826d7b959f95ece (diff) | |
| download | lwn-d6b9acc0c6c4a7c5d484d15271a5274656d0864f.tar.gz lwn-d6b9acc0c6c4a7c5d484d15271a5274656d0864f.zip | |
[PATCH] Document patch subject line better
Improve explanation of the Subject line fields in
Documentation/SubmittingPatches Canonical Patch Format.
Signed-off-by: Paul Jackson <pj@sgi.com>
Signed-off-by: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org>
| -rw-r--r-- | Documentation/SubmittingPatches | 24 |
1 files changed, 20 insertions, 4 deletions
diff --git a/Documentation/SubmittingPatches b/Documentation/SubmittingPatches index 1d96efec5e8f..237d54c44bc5 100644 --- a/Documentation/SubmittingPatches +++ b/Documentation/SubmittingPatches @@ -305,7 +305,7 @@ point out some special detail about the sign-off. The canonical patch subject line is: - Subject: [PATCH 001/123] [<area>:] <explanation> + Subject: [PATCH 001/123] subsystem: summary phrase The canonical patch message body contains the following: @@ -330,9 +330,25 @@ alphabetically by subject line - pretty much any email reader will support that - since because the sequence number is zero-padded, the numerical and alphabetic sort is the same. -See further details on how to phrase the "<explanation>" in the -"Subject:" line in Andrew Morton's "The perfect patch", referenced -below. +The "subsystem" in the email's Subject should identify which +area or subsystem of the kernel is being patched. + +The "summary phrase" in the email's Subject should concisely +describe the patch which that email contains. The "summary +phrase" should not be a filename. Do not use the same "summary +phrase" for every patch in a whole patch series. + +Bear in mind that the "summary phrase" of your email becomes +a globally-unique identifier for that patch. It propagates +all the way into the git changelog. The "summary phrase" may +later be used in developer discussions which refer to the patch. +People will want to google for the "summary phrase" to read +discussion regarding that patch. + +A couple of example Subjects: + + Subject: [patch 2/5] ext2: improve scalability of bitmap searching + Subject: [PATCHv2 001/207] x86: fix eflags tracking The "from" line must be the very first line in the message body, and has the form: |