checkpatch.pl shouldn't warn about a "Missing Signed-off-by: line by nominal patch author" if there is no nominal patch author. Without this change, checkpatch always gives me the following warning: WARNING: Missing Signed-off-by: line by nominal patch author '' Signed-off-by: Alan Stern scripts/checkpatch.pl | 2 +- 1 file changed, 1 insertion(+), 1 deletion(-) Index: usb-devel/scripts/checkpatch.pl =================================================================== --- usb-devel.orig/scripts/checkpatch.pl +++ usb-devel/scripts/checkpatch.pl @@ -6673,7 +6673,7 @@ sub process { if ($signoff == 0) { ERROR("MISSING_SIGN_OFF", "Missing Signed-off-by: line(s)\n"); - } elsif (!$authorsignoff) { + } elsif ($author ne '' && !$authorsignoff) { WARN("NO_AUTHOR_SIGN_OFF", "Missing Signed-off-by: line by nominal patch author '$author'\n"); }