linux-kernel - Re: [PATCH] relay: Remove unused relay_late_setup

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Message-ID: <70293376-71b0-4b9d-b3c1-224b640f470b@kernel.dk>
Date: Mon, 12 May 2025 19:49:03 -0600
From: Jens Axboe <axboe@...nel.dk>
To: Jason Xing <kerneljasonxing@...il.com>,
 Christoph Hellwig <hch@...radead.org>
Cc: Andy Shevchenko <andriy.shevchenko@...ux.intel.com>,
 Andrew Morton <akpm@...ux-foundation.org>, corbet@....net,
 linux-doc@...r.kernel.org, LKML <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>,
 linux@...blig.org, viro@...iv.linux.org.uk
Subject: Re: [PATCH] relay: Remove unused relay_late_setup_files

On 5/12/25 6:49 PM, Jason Xing wrote:
> On Mon, May 12, 2025 at 10:55?PM Christoph Hellwig <hch@...radead.org> wrote:
>>
>> On Mon, May 12, 2025 at 09:14:56AM +0300, Andy Shevchenko wrote:
>>> Also note, we usually do not care about the out-of-tree users. The main Q here
>>> why are they out-of-tree for so long time?
>>
>> We do not care.  If some of this ever gets submitted it can add the
>> needed helpers back.
>>
>> This entire discussion is silly.
>>
> 
> I'm surprised how you described it....
> 
> Now relay works like a filesystem which helps out-of-tree users
> transfer a large amount of data efficiently. it's totally not like
> other pure dead code. I meant what the trouble of just leaving it
> untouched in the kernel could be?
> 
> Let me put in a simpler way, two options, 1) just clean up, 2) keep it
> and help so-called 'out-of-tree' users even if you don't care. I don't
> figure out what the difficulty of keeping it is :S

I think Christoph's email was quite clear, and I also said _exactly_ the
same thing in an email two days ago: we never EVER keep code in
kernel that isn't used by in-kernel code. Period. It's not a debate,
this is the law, if you will. It's a core principle because it allows
the kernel to be maintainable, rather than need to care about out of
tree code when changes are made. Similarly, we don't have a kernel API,
not even at the source level.

This is one of the core tenets of the Linux kernel, and all in-tree code
must follow those. If you have aspirations of maintaining the relay code
going forward, you need to fully understand that. Either the dead code
goes, or the out-of-tree code that uses it must be merged. There's no
in-between.

-- 
Jens Axboe