Message-ID: <20250127073400.6307d033@foz.lan>
Date: Mon, 27 Jan 2025 07:39:29 +0100
From: Mauro Carvalho Chehab <mchehab+huawei@...nel.org>
To: Helen Mae Koike Fornazier <helen.koike@...labora.com>
Cc: "Nicolas Dufresne" <nicolas.dufresne@...labora.com>, "Nikolai
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Subject: Re: [PATCH v2 0/5] kci-gitlab: Introducing GitLab-CI Pipeline for
 Kernel Testing

Em Fri, 24 Jan 2025 16:49:30 -0300
Helen Mae Koike Fornazier <helen.koike@...labora.com> escreveu:

> Hi Mauro,
> 
> 
> 
> ---- On Fri, 24 Jan 2025 12:29:16 -0300 Mauro Carvalho Chehab  wrote ---
> 
>  > Em Fri, 24 Jan 2025 09:26:33 -0500 
>  > Nicolas Dufresne nicolas.dufresne@...labora.com> escreveu: 
>  >    
>  > > Hi, 
>  > > 
>  > > Le vendredi 24 janvier 2025 à 15:00 +0200, Nikolai Kondrashov a écrit :   
>  > > > On 1/24/25 2:16 PM, Jarkko Sakkinen wrote:   
>  > > > > On Fri Jan 24, 2025 at 10:12 AM EET, Laurent Pinchart wrote:   
>  > > > > > Gitlab as an open-source software project (the community edition) is one 
>  > > > > > thing, but can we please avoid advertising specific proprietary services 
>  > > > > > in the kernel documentation ?   
>  > > > > 
>  > > > > I don't think we should have any of this in the mainline kernel. 
>  > > > > 
>  > > > > One angle is that "no regressions rule" applies also to the shenanigans. 
>  > > > > 
>  > > > > Do we really spend energy on this proprietary crap to the eternity?   
>  > > > 
>  > > > This is not getting included into the kernel itself, the contributed code is, 
>  > > > of course, open-source. And yes it would execute just fine on the fully 
>  > > > open-source community-edition GitLab.   
>  >    
>  > > > I don't think "no regressions rule" should apply here.   
>  >  
>  > It doesn't, as this is not a Kernel userspace API. It is just some 
>  > facility to integrate Kernel builds using a CI infrastructure. This can 
>  > change with time as needed. 
>  >  
>  > Still, once people start using it, developers need to take some care to 
>  > avoid regressions that would cause CI builds to fail for the ones using 
>  > such facilities. 
>  >  
>  > Also, ideally, this should be completely independent of the Kernel version, 
>  > e.g. if one sets up an infra using the version that was there when, let's 
>  > say, Kernel 6.14 is released, the same CI scripts should work just fine 
>  > with stable Kernels and even future Kernels.   
> 
> Or you can just configure your GitLab CI to work and an older version of
> the script by just pointing the right yaml URL at that versions in the configs,
> or am I missing something?

The problem of placing them altogether is that it would be hard to track
incompatible changes, as there's not separate versioning for the yaml
files.

>  >  
>  > Due to that, I'm not convinced that such kernel CI files should be 
>  > hosted at the Kernel tree. 
>  >  
>  > IMO, this should be stored on a separate repository hosted at 
>  > kernel.org, using Semantic Versoning (https://semver.org/) - e. g. 
>  > when there are incompatible changes, major version number will be 
>  > increased.   
> 
> A key benefit of having it in-tree is the test expectation list, as seen with
> DRM-CI. This allows developers to track the state of drivers and progress over
> time by showing which tests are expected to pass or fail at a given point in
> history. (From what I see in DRM-CI, this adds a considerable amount of value.)
> Please check the VKMS patch in this patchset.

I'm not saying that everything should be on a separate tree. Things like
expected tests and test results are dependent at Kernel versions.

What I'm saying is that hosting CI-specific files a separate repository is
better, as you can keep there what is generic.

> Also, if we keep this tool out of tree, I’m concerned that subsystems like DRM
> and Media will continue not collaborating—each currently has its own solution
> when the base could be shared and reused. All static checks, build processes,
> and boot mechanisms are fundamentally the same, with only minor differences
> that are customizable. Other subsystems could use just the base or build their
> specific configurations/tests on top of it.

I'm in favor of having a common set of CI tooling for all subsystems interested
on setting up CI. Yet moving part of it to be on a separate repository won't
prevent collaboration. Also, either in or out of tree won't avoid different
subsystems to use different solutions.

What would make people use it is the capability of quickly setting it up
on a new repository. For this to happen, documentation is really important.
Equally important is to have support for multiple git forges and other CI engines.

For instance, besides media and DRM, I'm also personally interested on having
it setup for other subsystems that I also collaborate.

> Having it in-tree sends a message: "You can create your own GitLab CI pipeline,
> but why not use this existing one, contribute to it, and collaborate for
> everyone's benefit?".
>
> Since it's under the tools/ folder, it’s a helper tool.

It makes sense to have it documented at the Kernel Documentation folder
and to have something at tools/ that would setup the git forge repositories 
used for CI to do Kernel builds.

> Make sense?
> 
> Thanks,
> Helen
> 
>  >    
>  > > > This is for developers only, and is a template for making 
>  > > > your own pipeline mostly, with pieces which can be reused.   
>  > > 
>  > > Perhpas worth clarifying that Media and DRM subsystem have opted for the 
>  > > Freedesktop instance. This instance is running the Open Source version of 
>  > > Gitlab, with hundreds of CI runners contributed and shared among many projects 
>  > > (which includes Mesa, GStreamer, Wayland, Pipewire, libcamera, just to name 
>  > > few).   
>  >  
>  > It doesn't matter much what git forge some projects are currently using, as 
>  > things like that could change with time. 
>  >  
>  > Starting with supporting just one type of git forge sounds OK to me, 
>  > but long term goal should be to make it generic enough to be used with as 
>  > much CI engines as possible - not only forges developed by companies that 
>  > provide paid services like Gitlab/Github, but also completely open 
>  > source forges and even Jenkins. 
>  >  
>  > Thanks, 
>  > Mauro 
>  >   
> 



Thanks,
Mauro

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