Re: Ideas on column length in kernel "problem"?

[Randy Dunlap <randy.dunlap@oracle.com>]

On Fri, 24 Aug 2007 12:31:43 -0400 Scott Thompson wrote:

> On Fri, 24 Aug 2007 07:07:54 -0400 Jesper Juhl 
> <jesper.juhl@gmail.com> wrote:
> >On 24/08/07, Alan Cox <alan@lxorguk.ukuu.org.uk> wrote:
> >> > I think this is also a matter of conding style. 
> >Documentation/CodingStyle says:
> >> >
> >> > "The limit on the length of lines is 80 columns and this is a 
> >hard limit."
> >>
> >> As has repeatedly been stated this is a bug in 
> >Documentation/CodingStyle and bears no resemblence to reality.
> >>
> 
> Quite the hornet's nest I've stirred up -- I'm not trying to rock 
> the boat, just trying to row.
> 
> Meanwhile, I ran a couple programs against the 2.6.22.1 source to 
> get some statistics on the source in the linux kernel tree to 
> understand what 'reality' is:
> 
> Number of files -- 23742
> Number of lines > 80 columns:  247057
> Number of lines > 90 columns:  127016
> Number of lines > 100 columns: 21
> 
> The *winner* at 482 columns is a commented out line in
> 
> /linux-2.6.22.1/drivers/pci/hotplug/ibmphp_ebda.c 440 //		debug 
> ("rio_node_id: %x\nbbar: %x\nrio_type: %x\nowner_id: 
> %x\nport0_node: %x\nport0_port: %x\nport1_node: %x\nport1_port: 
> %x\nfirst_slot_num: %x\nstatus: %x\n", rio_detail_ptr->rio_node_id, 
> rio_detail_ptr->bbar, rio_detail_ptr->rio_type, rio_detail_ptr-
> >owner_id, rio_detail_ptr->port0_node_connect, rio_detail_ptr-
> >port0_port_connect, rio_detail_ptr->port1_node_connect, 
> rio_detail_ptr->port1_port_connect, rio_detail_ptr->first_slot_num, 
> rio_detail_ptr->status);
> 
> So I think updating the text in coding style one way or another is 
> a good thing since there are ~248k exceptions to the style rule...

We could update CodingStyle, but it's still just a guideline,
not a strict requirement, so how would that fix anything?

> I can make the bins + scripts I used to gather this and output of 
> this run available if anyone is interested.
> 
> However, this isn't the whole story.. one of the side effects of 
> the patch system through email clients are that the function name 
> in the 'git diff' (or comparable) output can tack on 20-25 columns 
> of header and further cause wordwrap strife and bring more patches 
> into this problem.  It *appears* that many maintainers are pretty 
> good at recognizing this and purging portions of the function names 
> when forwarding them around, but it's still a bigger and common 
> 'problem' for the wordwrapping clients.

diff -p output is preferred for diffs (for review).
I'm not aware of people purging that info.

> Example: 
> @@ -189,6 +189,9 @@ static __devinit int ixp4xx_pata_probe(struct 
> platform_device *pdev)
> 
> Common advice appears to be to get smtp working on gmail, and I 
> thank the list for their suggestions.  If I get one/two ways 
> working that are compliant for patch submittal w/o wordwrap (et al) 
> I'll start a 'howto' from my notes on yahoo and gmail/smtp setup 
> and post that up on the interweb.

Thanks.

---
~Randy
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