Re: [RFC PATCH] .clang-format: Remove conditional comments

[Miguel Ojeda]

On Wed, Nov 4, 2020 at 2:08 AM Nick Desaulniers <ndesaulniers@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> Miguel,
> Really? :P I'd bet if you picked up this patch no one would notice.
>
> I recommend a simpler approach to multiple version support, which is
> just matching the one version recommended for the rest of LLVM tools.
> Sure, technically you can use older tools, but do so at your own peril
> and don't complain to us if it doesn't work.  Otherwise trying to

Originally, the .clang-format file was made to work with old versions
in order to make it easy for people to use (just install it from your
distro etc.). One of the reasons for that was to help adoption, as
well as because clang-format gives a hard error on encountering an
unknown option :-(

I am not opposed to changing those requirements now and say it is part
of the LLVM toolchain (even if it is independent from building), but
somebody might be annoyed.

> explain different versions and even for different directories gets way
> too complex for anyone to take seriously.

That is just an escape hatch for developers that really need the
latest formatting options (e.g. to minimize the exceptions in fully
formatted files) or temporarily deal with some bits of kernel code
with a different style.

I definitely wouldn't want people adding their own .clang-format files
without good reason...

> It's not like we backport raising the minimum version.

That is a good point. In fact, we can just do it very early in the
cycle and wait to see who complains. If there are too many complaints,
we can always revert it.

Cheers,
Miguel