Re: [PATCH] Documentation: move Documentation/virtual to Documentation/virt

From: Jonathan Corbet
Date: Wed Jul 24 2019 - 14:00:09 EST


On Wed, 24 Jul 2019 10:51:36 +0200
Paolo Bonzini <pbonzini@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> On 24/07/19 09:24, Christoph Hellwig wrote:
> > Renaming docs seems to be en vogue at the moment, so fix on of the
> > grossly misnamed directories. We usually never use "virtual" as
> > a shortcut for virtualization in the kernel, but always virt,
> > as seen in the virt/ top-level directory. Fix up the documentation
> > to match that.
> >
> > Fixes: ed16648eb5b8 ("Move kvm, uml, and lguest subdirectories under a common "virtual" directory, I.E:")
> > Signed-off-by: Christoph Hellwig <hch@xxxxxx>
>
> Queued, thanks. I can't count how many times I said "I really should
> rename that directory".

...and it's up to Linus before I even got a chance to look at it - one has
to be fast around here...:)

There's nothing wrong with this move, but it does miss the point of much
of the reorganization that has been going on in the docs tree. It's not
just a matter of getting more pleasing names; the real idea is to create a
better, more reader-focused organization on kernel documentation as a
whole. Documentation/virt still has the sort of confusion of audiences
that we're trying to fix:

- kvm/api.txt pretty clearly belongs in the userspace-api book, rather
than tossed in with:

- kvm/review-checklist.txt, which belongs in the subsystem guide, if only
we'd gotten around to creating it yet, or

- kvm/mmu.txt, which is information for kernel developers, or

- uml/UserModeLinux-HOWTO.txt, which belongs in the admin guide.

I suspect that organization is going to be one of the main issues to talk
about in Lisbon. Meanwhile, I hope that this rename won't preclude
organizational work in the future.

Thanks,

jon