Re: [LSF/MM TOPIC] FS, MM, and stable trees

From: Amir Goldstein <amir73il@gmail.com>
To: Sasha Levin <sashal@kernel.org>
Cc: lsf-pc <lsf-pc@lists.linux-foundation.org>,
	linux-fsdevel <linux-fsdevel@vger.kernel.org>,
	Jan Kara <jack@suse.cz>, Theodore Tso <tytso@mit.edu>,
	"Darrick J. Wong" <darrick.wong@oracle.com>,
	Josef Bacik <josef@toxicpanda.com>,
	"Luis R. Rodriguez" <mcgrof@kernel.org>,
	Matthew Wilcox <willy@infradead.org>,
	Greg KH <gregkh@linuxfoundation.org>
Subject: Re: [LSF/MM TOPIC] FS, MM, and stable trees
Date: Tue, 8 Mar 2022 11:32:43 +0200	[thread overview]
Message-ID: <CAOQ4uxjysufPUtwepPGNZDhoC_HdsnkHx7--kso_OXWPyPkw_A@mail.gmail.com> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <20190212170012.GF69686@sasha-vm>

On Tue, Feb 12, 2019 at 7:31 PM Sasha Levin <sashal@kernel.org> wrote:
>
> Hi all,
>
> I'd like to propose a discussion about the workflow of the stable trees
> when it comes to fs/ and mm/. In the past year we had some friction with
> regards to the policies and the procedures around picking patches for
> stable tree, and I feel it would be very useful to establish better flow
> with the folks who might be attending LSF/MM.
>
> I feel that fs/ and mm/ are in very different places with regards to
> which patches go in -stable, what tests are expected, and the timeline
> of patches from the point they are proposed on a mailing list to the
> point they are released in a stable tree. Therefore, I'd like to propose
> two different sessions on this (one for fs/ and one for mm/), as a
> common session might be less conductive to agreeing on a path forward as
> the starting point for both subsystems are somewhat different.
>
> We can go through the existing processes, automation, and testing
> mechanisms we employ when building stable trees, and see how we can
> improve these to address the concerns of fs/ and mm/ folks.
>

Hi Sasha,

I think it would be interesting to have another discussion on the state of fs/
in -stable and see if things have changed over the past couple of years.
If you do not plan to attend LSF/MM in person, perhaps you will be able to
join this discussion remotely?

From what I can see, the flow of ext4/btrfs patches into -stable still looks
a lot healthier than the flow of xfs patches into -stable.

In 2019, Luis started an effort to improve this situation (with some
assistance from me and you) that ended up with several submissions
of stable patches for v4.19.y, but did not continue beyond 2019.

When one looks at xfstest bug reports on the list for xfs on kernels > v4.19
one has to wonder if using xfs on kernels v5.x.y is a wise choice.

Which makes me wonder: how do the distro kernel maintainers keep up
with xfs fixes?

Many of the developers on CC of this message are involved in development
of a distro kernel (at least being consulted with), so I would be very much
interested to know how and if this issue is being dealt with.

Thanks,
Amir.