linux-kernel - Re: [Ksummit-2013-discuss] When to push bug fixes to mainline

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Date:	Tue, 16 Jul 2013 11:40:54 -0700
From:	"H. Peter Anvin" <hpa@...or.com>
To:	David Lang <david@...g.hm>
CC:	Willy Tarreau <w@....eu>,
	Greg Kroah-Hartman <gregkh@...uxfoundation.org>,
	linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org, stable@...r.kernel.org,
	ksummit-2013-discuss@...ts.linux-foundation.org,
	torvalds@...ux-foundation.org
Subject: Re: [Ksummit-2013-discuss] When to push bug fixes to mainline

On 07/16/2013 12:19 AM, David Lang wrote:
> On Fri, 12 Jul 2013, Willy Tarreau wrote:
> 
>> And maybe in the end, having 1/10 patch cause a regression is not *that*
>> dramatic, and probably less than not fixing the 9 other bugs. In one case
>> we rely on -stable to merge the 10 fixes, and on the other case we'd rely
>> on -stable to just revert one of them.
> 
> Apologies for the late post, I'm catching up on things, but this jumped
> out at me.
> 
> We went through a LOT of pain several years ago when people got into the
> mindset that a patch was acceptable if it fixed more people than it
> broke. eliminating that mindset did wonders for kernel stability.
> 
> Regressions are a lot more of a negative than bugfixes are a positive, a
> 10:1 ratio of fixes to regressions is _not_ good enough.
> 

In my opinion, there is one exception, and that is when the problem
being fixed is much more severe than the fix.  *In particular* two
cases: permanently damaging hardware and corrupting data.  For example:
no boot, as severe as it is, is much better than either of these two
scenarios.

	-hpa

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