Re: [PATCH] arm64: dts: rockchip: Add a few aliases to the PineTab2 dtsi

[Heiko Stübner]

Am Donnerstag, 5. September 2024, 14:21:12 CEST schrieb Diederik de Haas:
> On Thu Sep 5, 2024 at 1:39 PM CEST, Krzysztof Kozlowski wrote:
> > On 05/09/2024 13:32, Dragan Simic wrote:
> > > Sprinkle a few commonly used aliases onto the PineTab2 dtsi file, to improve
> > > its readability a bit, to make it easier to refer to the actual nodes later,
> > > if needed, and to add a bit more detail to some of the labels.
> > > 
> > > Suggested-by: Diederik de Haas <didi.debian@xxxxxxxxx>
> > > Signed-off-by: Dragan Simic <dsimic@xxxxxxxxxxx>
> >
> > Unused aliases do not improve readability, so for me this change is
> > making code worse without valid reason.
> 
> This came forth by a question from me to Dragan about a patch for
> another board which doesn't have a charger defined at all (yet).
> I actually have that patch (but not the HW) for a while (~1.5 year)
> now and I had used `rk817_charger: charger` for that, probably because
> I saw that being used everywhere else.
> 
> Then I compared it to the PineTab2 and noticed it had only `charger`, so
> I asked "What should I use? With or without the alias?"
> In this case the inconsistency is causing confusion (with me).
> 
> So: What should be used for that other/new board(s)?

As Krzysztof said, having a phandle that is never going to be used is
somewhat pointless.

Having a phandle defined for a node does not hurt anything, so having
some in a board dts is not catastrophically bad, but there is no reason
to add or remove unused ones for no reason - especially as it affects
git blame .

So in short, if you see an unused phandle in a dts _patch_, just point it
out in review.


Heiko