]> git.proxmox.com Git - ovs.git/blame - CONTRIBUTING.md
netdev-dpdk: Fix coremask logic.
[ovs.git] / CONTRIBUTING.md
CommitLineData
55fa0147
BP
1How to Submit Patches for Open vSwitch
2======================================
3
d7564331 4Send changes to Open vSwitch as patches to dev@openvswitch.org.
55fa0147
BP
5One patch per email, please. More details are included below.
6
542cc9bb 7If you are using Git, then `git format-patch` takes care of most of
55fa0147
BP
8the mechanics described below for you.
9
10Before You Start
11----------------
12
13Before you send patches at all, make sure that each patch makes sense.
14In particular:
15
542cc9bb
TG
16 - A given patch should not break anything, even if later
17 patches fix the problems that it causes. The source tree
18 should still build and work after each patch is applied.
19 (This enables `git bisect` to work best.)
55fa0147 20
542cc9bb
TG
21 - A patch should make one logical change. Don't make
22 multiple, logically unconnected changes to disparate
23 subsystems in a single patch.
55fa0147 24
542cc9bb
TG
25 - A patch that adds or removes user-visible features should
26 also update the appropriate user documentation or manpages.
121daded
AA
27 Check "Feature Deprecation Guidelines" section in this document
28 if you intend to remove user-visible feature.
55fa0147
BP
29
30Testing is also important:
31
0d3f2152
BP
32 - A patch that modifies existing code should be tested with `make
33 check` before submission. Please see INSTALL.md, under
34 "Self-Tests", for more information.
93e83e8b
MK
35
36 - A patch that adds or deletes files should also be tested with
542cc9bb 37 `make distcheck` before submission.
55fa0147 38
542cc9bb
TG
39 - A patch that modifies Linux kernel code should be at least
40 build-tested on various Linux kernel versions before
8063e095 41 submission. I suggest versions 3.10 and whatever
542cc9bb 42 the current latest release version is at the time.
55fa0147 43
542cc9bb
TG
44 - A patch that modifies the ofproto or vswitchd code should be
45 tested in at least simple cases before submission.
55fa0147 46
542cc9bb
TG
47 - A patch that modifies xenserver code should be tested on
48 XenServer before submission.
55fa0147 49
cccf7e9d
TG
50If you are using GitHub, then you may utilize the travis-ci.org CI build
51system by linking your GitHub repository to it. This will run some of
52the above tests automatically when you push changes to your repository.
9feb1017
TG
53See the "Continuous Integration with Travis-CI" in the [INSTALL.md] file
54for details on how to set it up.
cccf7e9d 55
55fa0147
BP
56Email Subject
57-------------
58
59The subject line of your email should be in the following format:
542cc9bb 60`[PATCH <n>/<m>] <area>: <summary>`
55fa0147 61
542cc9bb
TG
62 - `[PATCH <n>/<m>]` indicates that this is the nth of a series
63 of m patches. It helps reviewers to read patches in the
64 correct order. You may omit this prefix if you are sending
65 only one patch.
55fa0147 66
542cc9bb
TG
67 - `<area>:` indicates the area of the Open vSwitch to which the
68 change applies (often the name of a source file or a
69 directory). You may omit it if the change crosses multiple
70 distinct pieces of code.
55fa0147 71
542cc9bb 72 - `<summary>` briefly describes the change.
55fa0147 73
542cc9bb 74The subject, minus the `[PATCH <n>/<m>]` prefix, becomes the first line
55fa0147
BP
75of the commit's change log message.
76
77Description
78-----------
79
80The body of the email should start with a more thorough description of
81the change. This becomes the body of the commit message, following
82the subject. There is no need to duplicate the summary given in the
83subject.
84
85Please limit lines in the description to 79 characters in width.
86
87The description should include:
88
542cc9bb 89 - The rationale for the change.
55fa0147 90
542cc9bb
TG
91 - Design description and rationale (but this might be better
92 added as code comments).
55fa0147 93
542cc9bb
TG
94 - Testing that you performed (or testing that should be done
95 but you could not for whatever reason).
55fa0147 96
542cc9bb 97 - Tags (see below).
80eb2acf 98
55fa0147
BP
99There is no need to describe what the patch actually changed, if the
100reader can see it for himself.
101
102If the patch refers to a commit already in the Open vSwitch
103repository, please include both the commit number and the subject of
8d62e151
BP
104the patch, e.g. 'commit 632d136c (vswitch: Remove restriction on
105datapath names.)'.
55fa0147
BP
106
107If you, the person sending the patch, did not write the patch
108yourself, then the very first line of the body should take the form
542cc9bb 109`From: <author name> <author email>`, followed by a blank line. This
55fa0147 110will automatically cause the named author to be credited with
80eb2acf
BP
111authorship in the repository.
112
113Tags
114----
115
116The description ends with a series of tags, written one to a line as
117the last paragraph of the email. Each tag indicates some property of
118the patch in an easily machine-parseable manner.
119
120Examples of common tags follow.
121
122 Signed-off-by: Author Name <author.name@email.address...>
123
124 Informally, this indicates that Author Name is the author or
125 submitter of a patch and has the authority to submit it under
126 the terms of the license. The formal meaning is to agree to
127 the Developer's Certificate of Origin (see below).
128
129 If the author and submitter are different, each must sign off.
130 If the patch has more than one author, all must sign off.
131
132 Signed-off-by: Author Name <author.name@email.address...>
133 Signed-off-by: Submitter Name <submitter.name@email.address...>
134
135 Co-authored-by: Author Name <author.name@email.address...>
136
137 Git can only record a single person as the author of a given
138 patch. In the rare event that a patch has multiple authors,
139 one must be given the credit in Git and the others must be
140 credited via Co-authored-by: tags. (All co-authors must also
141 sign off.)
142
143 Acked-by: Reviewer Name <reviewer.name@email.address...>
144
145 Reviewers will often give an Acked-by: tag to code of which
146 they approve. It is polite for the submitter to add the tag
147 before posting the next version of the patch or applying the
148 patch to the repository. Quality reviewing is hard work, so
149 this gives a small amount of credit to the reviewer.
150
151 Not all reviewers give Acked-by: tags when they provide
152 positive reviews. It's customary only to add tags from
153 reviewers who actually provide them explicitly.
154
155 Tested-by: Tester Name <reviewer.name@email.address...>
156
157 When someone tests a patch, it is customary to add a
158 Tested-by: tag indicating that. It's rare for a tester to
159 actually provide the tag; usually the patch submitter makes
160 the tag himself in response to an email indicating successful
161 testing results.
162
1b17f053
BP
163 Tested-at: <URL>
164
165 When a test report is publicly available, this provides a way
166 to reference it. Typical <URL>s would be build logs from
167 autobuilders or references to mailing list archives.
168
169 Some autobuilders only retain their logs for a limited amount
170 of time. It is less useful to cite these because they may be
171 dead links for a developer reading the commit message months
172 or years later.
173
80eb2acf
BP
174 Reported-by: Reporter Name <reporter.name@email.address...>
175
176 When a patch fixes a bug reported by some person, please
177 credit the reporter in the commit log in this fashion. Please
178 also add the reporter's name and email address to the list of
179 people who provided helpful bug reports in the AUTHORS file at
180 the top of the source tree.
181
182 Fairly often, the reporter of a bug also tests the fix.
183 Occasionally one sees a combined "Reported-and-tested-by:" tag
184 used to indicate this. It is also acceptable, and more
185 common, to include both tags separately.
186
187 (If a bug report is received privately, it might not always be
188 appropriate to publicly credit the reporter. If in doubt,
189 please ask the reporter.)
190
191 Requested-by: Requester Name <requester.name@email.address...>
192 Suggested-by: Suggester Name <suggester.name@email.address...>
193
194 When a patch implements a request or a suggestion made by some
195 person, please credit that person in the commit log in this
196 fashion. For a helpful suggestion, please also add the
197 person's name and email address to the list of people who
198 provided suggestions in the AUTHORS file at the top of the
199 source tree.
200
201 (If a suggestion or a request is received privately, it might
202 not always be appropriate to publicly give credit. If in
203 doubt, please ask.)
204
205 Reported-at: <URL>
206
207 If a patch fixes or is otherwise related to a bug reported in
208 a public bug tracker, please include a reference to the bug in
209 the form of a URL to the specific bug, e.g.:
210
211 Reported-at: https://bugs.debian.org/743635
212
213 This is also an appropriate way to refer to bug report emails
214 in public email archives, e.g.:
215
216 Reported-at: http://openvswitch.org/pipermail/dev/2014-June/040952.html
55fa0147 217
1e289cff
RB
218 Submitted-at: <URL>
219
220 If a patch was submitted somewhere other than the Open vSwitch
221 development mailing list, such as a GitHub pull request, this header can
222 be used to reference the source.
223
224 Submitted-at: https://github.com/openvswitch/ovs/pull/92
225
80eb2acf 226 VMware-BZ: #1234567
af822017 227 ONF-JIRA: EXT-12345
d60a2b53 228
80eb2acf
BP
229 If a patch fixes or is otherwise related to a bug reported in
230 a private bug tracker, you may include some tracking ID for
231 the bug for your own reference. Please include some
af822017
BP
232 identifier to make the origin clear, e.g. "VMware-BZ" refers
233 to VMware's internal Bugzilla instance and "ONF-JIRA" refers
234 to the Open Networking Foundation's JIRA bug tracker.
d60a2b53 235
80eb2acf
BP
236 Bug #1234567.
237 Issue: 1234567
d60a2b53 238
80eb2acf
BP
239 These are obsolete forms of VMware-BZ: that can still be seen
240 in old change log entries. (They are obsolete because they do
241 not tell the reader what bug tracker is referred to.)
d60a2b53 242
5a6b18a9
RB
243 Fixes: 63bc9fb1c69f (“packets: Reorder CS_* flags to remove gap.”)
244
245 If you would like to record which commit introduced a bug being fixed,
246 you may do that with a “Fixes” header. This assists in determining
247 which OVS releases have the bug, so the patch can be applied to all
248 affected versions. The easiest way to generate the header in the
249 proper format is with this git command:
250
251 git log -1 --pretty=format:"Fixes: %h (\"%s\")" --abbrev=12 COMMIT_REF
252
c847265e
BP
253 Vulnerability: CVE-2016-2074
254
255 Specifies that the patch fixes or is otherwise related to a
256 security vulnerability with the given CVE identifier. Other
257 identifiers in public vulnerability databases are also
258 suitable.
259
260 If the vulnerability was reported publicly, then it is also
261 appropriate to cite the URL to the report in a Reported-at
262 tag. Use a Reported-by tag to acknowledge the reporters.
263
d60a2b53
CW
264Developer's Certificate of Origin
265---------------------------------
266
267To help track the author of a patch as well as the submission chain,
268and be clear that the developer has authority to submit a patch for
269inclusion in openvswitch please sign off your work. The sign off
270certifies the following:
271
272 Developer's Certificate of Origin 1.1
273
274 By making a contribution to this project, I certify that:
275
276 (a) The contribution was created in whole or in part by me and I
277 have the right to submit it under the open source license
278 indicated in the file; or
279
280 (b) The contribution is based upon previous work that, to the best
281 of my knowledge, is covered under an appropriate open source
282 license and I have the right under that license to submit that
283 work with modifications, whether created in whole or in part
284 by me, under the same open source license (unless I am
285 permitted to submit under a different license), as indicated
286 in the file; or
287
288 (c) The contribution was provided directly to me by some other
289 person who certified (a), (b) or (c) and I have not modified
290 it.
291
292 (d) I understand and agree that this project and the contribution
293 are public and that a record of the contribution (including all
294 personal information I submit with it, including my sign-off) is
295 maintained indefinitely and may be redistributed consistent with
296 this project or the open source license(s) involved.
297
121daded
AA
298Feature Deprecation Guidelines
299------------------------------
300
301Open vSwitch is intended to be user friendly. This means that under
302normal circumstances we don't abruptly remove features from OVS that
303some users might still be using. Otherwise, if we would, then we would
304possibly break our user setup when they upgrade and would receive bug
305reports.
306
307Typical process to deprecate a feature in Open vSwitch is to:
308
309 (a) Mention deprecation of a feature in the NEWS file. Also, mention
310 expected release or absolute time when this feature would be removed
311 from OVS altogether. Don't use relative time (e.g. "in 6 months")
312 because that is not clearly interpretable.
313
314 (b) If Open vSwitch is configured to use deprecated feature it should print
315 a warning message to the log files clearly indicating that feature is
316 deprecated and that use of it should be avoided.
317
318 (c) If this feature is mentioned in man pages, then add "Deprecated" keyword
319 to it.
320
321Also, if there is alternative feature to the one that is about to be marked
322as deprecated, then mention it in (a), (b) and (c) as well.
323
324Remember to followup and actually remove the feature from OVS codebase
325once deprecation grace period has expired and users had opportunity to
326use at least one OVS release that would have informed them about feature
327deprecation!
328
55fa0147
BP
329Comments
330--------
331
332If you want to include any comments in your email that should not be
333part of the commit's change log message, put them after the
542cc9bb 334description, separated by a line that contains just `---`. It may be
55fa0147
BP
335helpful to include a diffstat here for changes that touch multiple
336files.
337
338Patch
339-----
340
566b8c8d 341The patch should be in the body of the email following the description,
55fa0147
BP
342separated by a blank line.
343
542cc9bb
TG
344Patches should be in `diff -up` format. We recommend that you use Git
345to produce your patches, in which case you should use the `-M -C`
346options to `git diff` (or other Git tools) if your patch renames or
55fa0147
BP
347copies files. Quilt (http://savannah.nongnu.org/projects/quilt) might
348be useful if you do not want to use Git.
349
350Patches should be inline in the email message. Some email clients
351corrupt white space or wrap lines in patches. There are hints on how
352to configure many email clients to avoid this problem at:
353 http://git.kernel.org/?p=linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux-2.6.git;a=blob_plain;f=Documentation/email-clients.txt
354If you cannot convince your email client not to mangle patches, then
355sending the patch as an attachment is a second choice.
356
357Please follow the style used in the code that you are modifying. The
9feb1017
TG
358[CodingStyle.md] file describes the coding style used in most of Open
359vSwitch. Use Linux kernel coding style for Linux kernel code.
55fa0147 360
c599d5cc
AC
361If your code is non-datapath code, you may use the
362`utilities/checkpatch.py` utility as a quick check for certain commonly
363occuring mistakes (improper leading/trailing whitespace, missing signoffs,
364some improper formatted patch files). For linux datapath code, it is
365a good idea to use the linux script `checkpatch.pl`.
366
55fa0147
BP
367Example
368-------
369
542cc9bb 370```
d60a2b53
CW
371From fa29a1c2c17682879e79a21bb0cdd5bbe67fa7c0 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
372From: Jesse Gross <jesse@nicira.com>
373Date: Thu, 8 Dec 2011 13:17:24 -0800
374Subject: [PATCH] datapath: Alphabetize include/net/ipv6.h compat header.
55fa0147 375
d60a2b53 376Signed-off-by: Jesse Gross <jesse@nicira.com>
55fa0147 377---
d60a2b53
CW
378 datapath/linux/Modules.mk | 2 +-
379 1 files changed, 1 insertions(+), 1 deletions(-)
380
381diff --git a/datapath/linux/Modules.mk b/datapath/linux/Modules.mk
382index fdd952e..f6cb88e 100644
383--- a/datapath/linux/Modules.mk
384+++ b/datapath/linux/Modules.mk
385@@ -56,11 +56,11 @@ openvswitch_headers += \
386 linux/compat/include/net/dst.h \
387 linux/compat/include/net/genetlink.h \
388 linux/compat/include/net/ip.h \
389+ linux/compat/include/net/ipv6.h \
390 linux/compat/include/net/net_namespace.h \
391 linux/compat/include/net/netlink.h \
392 linux/compat/include/net/protocol.h \
393 linux/compat/include/net/route.h \
394- linux/compat/include/net/ipv6.h \
395 linux/compat/genetlink.inc
55fa0147 396
d60a2b53 397 both_modules += brcompat
55fa0147 398--
d60a2b53 3991.7.7.3
542cc9bb 400```
55fa0147 401
9feb1017
TG
402[INSTALL.md]:INSTALL.md
403[CodingStyle.md]:CodingStyle.md