linux-kernel - Re: [PATCH v4 08/19] tools/docs: sphinx-build-wrapper: add a wrapper for sphinx-build

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Message-ID: <87ldmkojo5.fsf@trenco.lwn.net>
Date: Thu, 11 Sep 2025 13:47:54 -0600
From: Jonathan Corbet <corbet@....net>
To: Jani Nikula <jani.nikula@...ux.intel.com>, Mauro Carvalho Chehab
 <mchehab+huawei@...nel.org>
Cc: Mauro Carvalho Chehab <mchehab+huawei@...nel.org>, Linux Doc Mailing
 List <linux-doc@...r.kernel.org>, Björn Roy Baron
 <bjorn3_gh@...tonmail.com>, Alex Gaynor <alex.gaynor@...il.com>, Alice
 Ryhl <aliceryhl@...gle.com>, Boqun Feng <boqun.feng@...il.com>, Gary Guo
 <gary@...yguo.net>, Trevor Gross <tmgross@...ch.edu>,
 linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org, rust-for-linux@...r.kernel.org
Subject: Re: [PATCH v4 08/19] tools/docs: sphinx-build-wrapper: add a
 wrapper for sphinx-build

Jani Nikula <jani.nikula@...ux.intel.com> writes:

> On Thu, 11 Sep 2025, Jonathan Corbet <corbet@....net> wrote:
>> A couple of times I have looked into using intersphinx, making each book
>> into an actually separate book.  The thing I always run into is that
>> doing a complete docs build, with working references, would require
>> building everything twice.  This is probably worth another attempt one
>> of these years...
>
> I think the main factor in that should be whether it makes sense from
> overall documentation standpoint, not the technical details.
>
> Having several books might make sense. It might even be helpful in
> organizing the documentation by audiences. But having the granularity of
> SPHINXDIRS with that would be overkill. And there needs to be a book to
> bring them together, and link to the other books, acting as the landing
> page.

Well, I think that the number of existing directories needs to be
reduced rather further.  I made progress in that direction by coalescing
all the arch docs under Documentation/arch/.  I would like to do
something similar with all the device-specific docs, creating
Documentation/devices/.  Then we start to get to a reasonable number of
books.

> I believe it should be possible to generate the intersphinx inventory
> without generating the full html or pdf documentation. So I don't think
> it's actually two complete docs builds. It might speed things up to have
> a number of independent documentation builds.

That's a good point, I hadn't looked into that part.  The builder phase
takes a lot of the time, if that could be cut out things would go
faster. 

> As to the working references, IIUC partial builds with SPHINXDIRS
> doesn't get that part right if there are references outside of the
> designated dirs, leading to warnings.

That is true.  My point though is that, to get the references right with
a *full* build, a two-pass approach is needed though, as you suggest,
perhaps the first pass could be faster.

Thanks,

jon