Status of MAINTAINERS clean-up

From: Lukas Bulwahn
Date: Tue Jun 30 2020 - 16:25:47 EST


Hi all,

as Ralf Ramsauer and Pia Eichinger coincidently picked up and worked on
the same MAINTAINERS clean-up task, Ralf requested to get a quick report
on the state of the MAINTAINERS clean-up. Here you go.

I regularly run ./scripts/get_maintainers.pl ./scripts/get_maintainer.pl
--self-test=patterns on Linus' tree and linux-next, address the issues and
send out minor patches or simply report to the committers after a basic
analysis.

Currently on v5.8-rc3, we have 17 warnings. On next-20200629, we have 16
warnings with some overlap with the v5.8-rc3 warnings.

In more detail, here are all findings, put into categories and grouped
when addressed with one patch.


WARNING ON v5.8-rc3, ADDRESSED IN next-20200629

./MAINTAINERS:3949: warning: no file matches F: Documentation/devicetree/bindings/rng/arm-cctrng.txt
./MAINTAINERS:5493: warning: no file matches F: Documentation/devicetree/bindings/display/panel/raydium,rm67191.txt
./MAINTAINERS:14577: warning: no file matches F: Documentation/devicetree/bindings/thermal/rcar-gen3-thermal.txt
./MAINTAINERS:14578: warning: no file matches F: Documentation/devicetree/bindings/thermal/rcar-thermal.txt

No further action required.


WARNING ON v5.8-rc3 AND next-20200629, PATCH PENDING


[PATCH] MAINTAINERS: rectify entry in ARM SMC WATCHDOG DRIVER
./MAINTAINERS:1492: warning: no file matches F: devicetree/bindings/watchdog/arm-smc-wdt.yaml
Pending Patch: https://lore.kernel.org/linux-watchdog/20200602052104.7795-1-lukas.bulwahn@xxxxxxxxx/


[PATCH v2 RESEND] MAINTAINERS: rectify MMP SUPPORT after moving cputype.h
./MAINTAINERS:11487: warning: no file matches F: linux/soc/mmp/
Pending Patch: https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/20200506053431.7464-1-lukas.bulwahn@xxxxxxxxx/


[PATCH SECOND RESEND] MAINTAINERS: adjust entries to moving CEC platform drivers
./MAINTAINERS:2410: warning: no file matches F: drivers/media/platform/s5p-cec/
./MAINTAINERS:2555: warning: no file matches F: drivers/media/platform/tegra-cec/
./MAINTAINERS:3976: warning: no file matches F: drivers/media/platform/cec-gpio/
./MAINTAINERS:11155: warning: no file matches F: drivers/media/platform/meson/ao-cec-g12a.c
./MAINTAINERS:11156: warning: no file matches F: drivers/media/platform/meson/ao-cec.c
./MAINTAINERS:15266: warning: no file matches F: drivers/media/platform/seco-cec/seco-cec.c
./MAINTAINERS:15267: warning: no file matches F: drivers/media/platform/seco-cec/seco-cec.h
./MAINTAINERS:16305: warning: no file matches F: drivers/media/platform/sti/cec/
Pending Patch: https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/20200525142946.8268-1-lukas.bulwahn@xxxxxxxxx/


WARNING ON v5.8-rc3 AND next-20200629, UNADDRESSED


./MAINTAINERS:11457: warning: no file matches F: drivers/*/*/*loongson2*
./MAINTAINERS:11467: warning: no file matches F: drivers/*/*/*loongson3*
./MAINTAINERS:11468: warning: no file matches F: drivers/*/*loongson3*

I had a first look, it is a special case, the committer wants to be
informed on all loongson{2,3} files in drivers, but really in the last
two years, there is only one directory that appeared in the repository
and matched these patterns. So, one could probably just settle for naming
the file that is in the repository right now. I did not send a patch yet,
though.


WARNING ONLY ON next-20200629, PATCH ACCEPTED


[PATCH] MAINTAINERS: remove obsolete entry after file renaming
./MAINTAINERS:5024: warning: no file matches F: drivers/regulator/da903x.c
Accepted Patch: https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/20200628180229.5068-1-lukas.bulwahn@xxxxxxxxx/

No further action required.


WARNING ONLY ON next-20200629, ADDRESSED DIFFERENTLY


./MAINTAINERS:6874: warning: no file matches F: Documentation/devicetree/bindings/i2c/i2c-imx-lpi2c.txt
Warning just appeared recently, warnings on
Documentation/devicetree/bindings/ are usually addressed by devicetree
maintainers before the pull request. So, no action required for now.


./MAINTAINERS:14057: warning: no file matches F: Documentation/networking/device_drivers/ethernet/qlogic/LICENSE.qla3xxx
Appeared with a recent commit of moving files in Documentation.

The real clean-up task for that file is described here:
https://lore.kernel.org/linux-spdx/alpine.DEB.2.21.2006300644130.4919@felia/


SUMMARY

At the moment, I do not see too much potential for others to really
contribute to this specific clean-up. Once the pending patches are picked
up, which is tricky part, i.e., resubmitting and reminding, there have
been so far not too many new warnings appearing, and the warnings on .txt
to .yaml conversions in Documentation/devicetree/bindings/ are usually
followed up by some devicetree maintainers and janitors.


Other MAINTAINERS clean up topics, I see on a longer task list are:

- Go through the L: entries and address, "lists" that are 'email
forwarders', but not (public) mailing lists with archives.
Current idea is to either mark them special or make them M: or R:
entries.

- Assigning files to the "right" sections, not just having them lay
around in THE REST. This will be lots of manual work and needs some kind
of script-assisted approach, as many files are headers in include.

- Documenting the properties for a clean MAINTAINERS file and the
available checkers and tools

Contribution to those tasks are welcome, but they are by no means quick
and easy fixes. They will need some thought and lots of persistence and
patience to get done.


Lukas