On Thu, 2017-12-21 at 10:40 +0800, Jason Yan wrote:
> My editor always try to remove the extra white space at the end of the
> line when I make some changes. I'm tired of adjusting them manually.
> Can we remove them in mainline?
Hello Jason,
I think this means that your editor has been misconfigured. Any kernel code
changes should be the result of a deliberate action by a human. Configuring an
editor to apply any changes automatically to existing code is wrong.
There are several reasons why most kernel maintainers ignore patches like this
one silently:
* Whitespace changes make it harder than necessary to backport patches to
distro kernels. Before a patch that came later than the whitespace changes
can be backported, the whitespace change has to be backported. Additionally,
if a whitespace change touches many source files, the order in which to
backport patches becomes really important.
* Before a kernel developer posts a patch that fixes a bug she or he has to
verify the change history (git log -p) to figure out which patch introduced
the bug. Patches that only change coding style pollute the change history.
* Accepting a patch that only changes whitespace would open the floodgates for
other kernel coding style change patches. If a patch that only changes
whitespace would get accepted it will become hard to keep other kernel
coding style change patches out. A few examples of recently posted coding
style patches that do not change any functionality are:
- scsi_dh: fix format of struct members
(https://marc.info/?l=linux-scsi&m=151344115716122&w=2).
- PS3: Adjustments for six function implementations
(https://www.spinics.net/lists/linux-kernel-janitors/msg38252.html).
See also https://btrfs.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/Developer%27s_FAQ#How_not_to_start.
Thanks,
Bart.
