netdev - Re: [PATCH 19/20] drivers/net/ethernet/marvell/skge.c: fix error return code

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Message-Id: <20121004.145419.1859367129463136197.davem@davemloft.net>
Date:	Thu, 04 Oct 2012 14:54:19 -0400 (EDT)
From:	David Miller <davem@...emloft.net>
To:	peter.senna@...il.com
Cc:	shemminger@...tta.com, mlindner@...vell.com,
	kernel-janitors@...r.kernel.org, netdev@...r.kernel.org,
	linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org
Subject: Re: [PATCH 19/20] drivers/net/ethernet/marvell/skge.c: fix error
 return code

From: Peter Senna Tschudin <peter.senna@...il.com>
Date: Thu, 4 Oct 2012 20:49:57 +0200

> On Thu, Oct 4, 2012 at 8:23 PM, David Miller <davem@...emloft.net> wrote:
>> From: Peter Senna Tschudin <peter.senna@...il.com>
>> Date: Thu, 4 Oct 2012 19:32:12 +0200
>>
>>> I can't understand the advantages of describing each patch as you are
>>> asking. "For me" the generic commit message together with the patch
>>> makes sense.  Can you please help me on that?
>>
>> Stop being so dense.
>>
>> We want to know the implications of the bug being fixed.
>>
>> Does it potentially cause an OOPS?  Bad reference counting and thus
>> potential leaks or early frees?
>>
>> You have to analyze the implications and ramifications of the bug
>> being fixed.  We need that information.
>>
>> Your commit messages are in fact robotic, they don't describe the
>> salient details of what kinds of problems the bug being fixed might
>> cause.
>>
>> It's just "bad error code, this is the script that fixed it, kthx,
>> bye" which is pretty much useless for anaylsis.
> 
> Thank you David.
> 
> What about this as commit message?
> --- // --
> This patch fixes bug(s) related to return value of function(s). In
> some error cases, the function is returning non-negative SUCCESS
> value, when the correct would be negative ERROR value.
> 
> When on error, returning non negatives values, or SUCCESS, breaks error
> propagation, producing unpredictable behavior that are very difficult
> to debug.
> --- // --

What does it potentially cause the caller to do?  Will it potentially
treat an error as a success and as a result register an object
illegally?

Real analysis please.  The text you provided above is basically still
robotic and could be used to describe any error code return fix.
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