On Sun, Apr 4, 2010 at 2:56 PM, Andrew Lunn andrew@lunn.ch wrote:
Sorry about the conflict, thanks for redoing the changes. Where can I find the current and development branches? I want to avoid doing this mistake again in the future. Specially since I'm planning on doing some janitorial work on Staging for a while if it's OK with you guys. I see it as nice experience and practice while learning and getting ready for more valuable contributions :)
Sven has told you about how batman uses different repositories. You can find some more information at:
http://www.open-mesh.org/wiki/UsingBatmanGit
When working on other staging drivers i suggest you work on either the linux-next tree, or contact the driver maintainers and ask if they have there own development tree. Staging drivers tend to be fast moving. They change a lot. What is in the current release kernel, which is effectively 3 months old, can be very different to the latest development version. I've received many patches to things we have fixed months ago and are either waiting in linux-next for the next kernel release, or our in or development tree. I'm sure the same applies to other drivers in staging.
Andrew,
Oh thanks! After learning about this about the batman development tree I wondered how to find out where the equivalent branches for other projects are. Checking the linux-next branch sounds great. I'm still learning the details of the kernel development process, I knew about this branch but now I understand it's function and purpose.
I will also contact driver maintainers before sending a patch even if it is small. I appreciate hugely that Sven redid my changes with the new branch, but I don't want to create more work for a maintainer in the future. On the contrary, I want to help :)
Another option for interesting work to get involved in the kernel is to ask GregKH if there is a staging driver which is not being actively worked on. Some drivers just get dumped there and nobody spends the time and effort needed to get them merged. After a while they get thrown out of the staging. You could adopt such a driver, get hold of the hardware and do the work needed to get it out of staging and into the main tree.
Andrew
That sounds awesome. I will contact him and see if there is any orphan driver that is of my interest and that I can get my hands on the hardware. I presume it is a good starting point since it involves doing the last steps of the process and not starting something from scratch. A good angle to understand the 'big picture' of driver development better.
Thanks a million for the suggestions and help. :)
Luis
PD: By the way, I know top posting is a big no-no. is inline posting ok? in cases like your email where the two paragraphs address diferent topics I find it more logical to down-post after each one. just checking before I continue doing so.