Re: [Xen-devel] AMD/IOMMU: revert "SR56x0 Erratum 64 - Reset all head & tail pointers"

[Ian Campbell <Ian.Campbell@xxxxxxxxxx>]

On Tue, 2013-06-04 at 10:38 +0100, George Dunlap wrote:
> In this context, I would read "Acked-by" as "I agree that this should go 
> in", or at very least, "I am happy for this to go in"; whereas to me 
> "Reviewed-by" to me sounds like, "I took a close look at the code and 
> didn't see anything wrong, but otherwise have no opinion on the matter."

I think we decided (somewhat informally I think) that we interpreted
Foo-by according to Linux's Documentation/SubmittingPatches:

        If a person was not directly involved in the preparation or handling of 
a
        patch but wishes to signify and record their approval of it then they 
can
        arrange to have an Acked-by: line added to the patch's changelog.
        
        Acked-by: is often used by the maintainer of the affected code when that
        maintainer neither contributed to nor forwarded the patch.
        
        Acked-by: is not as formal as Signed-off-by:.  It is a record that the 
acker
        has at least reviewed the patch and has indicated acceptance.  Hence 
patch
        mergers will sometimes manually convert an acker's "yep, looks good to 
me"
        into an Acked-by:.
        
        Acked-by: does not necessarily indicate acknowledgement of the entire 
patch.
        For example, if a patch affects multiple subsystems and has an 
Acked-by: from
        one subsystem maintainer then this usually indicates acknowledgement of 
just
        the part which affects that maintainer's code.  Judgement should be 
used here.
        When in doubt people should refer to the original discussion in the 
mailing
        list archives.
        
        [...]

Reviewed-by is somehow more formal:

        Reviewed-by:, instead, indicates that the patch has been reviewed and 
found
        acceptable according to the Reviewer's Statement:
        
                Reviewer's statement of oversight
        
                By offering my Reviewed-by: tag, I state that:
        
                 (a) I have carried out a technical review of this patch to
                     evaluate its appropriateness and readiness for inclusion 
into
                     the mainline kernel.
        
                 (b) Any problems, concerns, or questions relating to the patch
                     have been communicated back to the submitter.  I am 
satisfied
                     with the submitter's response to my comments.
        
                 (c) While there may be things that could be improved with this
                     submission, I believe that it is, at this time, (1) a
                     worthwhile modification to the kernel, and (2) free of 
known
                     issues which would argue against its inclusion.
        
                 (d) While I have reviewed the patch and believe it to be 
sound, I
                     do not (unless explicitly stated elsewhere) make any
                     warranties or guarantees that it will achieve its stated
                     purpose or function properly in any given situation.
        
        A Reviewed-by tag is a statement of opinion that the patch is an
        appropriate modification of the kernel without any remaining serious
        technical issues.  Any interested reviewer (who has done the work) can
        offer a Reviewed-by tag for a patch.  This tag serves to give credit to
        reviewers and to inform maintainers of the degree of review which has 
been
        done on the patch.  Reviewed-by: tags, when supplied by reviewers known 
to
        understand the subject area and to perform thorough reviews, will 
normally
        increase the likelihood of your patch getting into the kernel.
        
Acked-by is supposedly something which is offered by the maintainer of
the relevant code to indicate they are happy for it to go in. In the
Linux world that might be via a different maintainer's tree (for cross
subsystem stuff) or be an indication from e.g. a driver maintainer to
the subsystem maintainer that the patch can be applied. In the Xen world
I think we interpret an Ack from someone in MAINTAINERS as a signal to
the committers that the patch should be committed.

Ian.



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