Re: Commit messages and the move to git

[Jonathan Wakely <jwakely dot gcc at gmail dot com>]

On Mon, 4 Nov 2019 at 17:42, Joseph Myers wrote:
>
> On Mon, 4 Nov 2019, Segher Boessenkool wrote:
>
> > On Mon, Nov 04, 2019 at 04:19:25PM +0000, Jonathan Wakely wrote:
> > > I've already proposed a more specific format for libstdc++:
> > > https://gcc.gnu.org/ml/libstdc++/2019-09/msg00122.html
> >
> > PR libstdc++/12345 takes up the first 19 chars of the short subject,
> > adding no useful information (unless the reader knows all PRs by heart,
> > you need to look it up to know what it is).
> >
> > I usually put (PR12345) at the end of the subject.  The area is clear
> > from the rest of the subject already.
>
> Agreed.  (Hint to patch submitters: if the subject line of your patch
> submission is just "Fix PR12345" or similar, people are less likely to
> review your patch because nothing about the subject tells anyone that the
> patch is in their area and so something they should pay attention to.
> Patch submissions need to have subjects that make clear very quickly what
> the patch is about.  This is also why I don't care for [PATCH] tags at the
> start of subject lines - they take away space for saying what the patch is
> about, and on gcc-patches we can expect things are patches, [PATCH]
> doesn't add useful information.)

I don't mind [PATCH] in the subject of patch emails (maybe because
nearly all my patches go to libstdc++@ as well, and not all mails on
that list are patches), but it has negative value in the commit log.

My mail to the libstdc++ list should have noted that [PATCH] tags in
the email subject should be omitted from the summary in the first line
of the commit log.


> I've been using git-style commit messages in GCC for the past five years.

I think I only started four years ago :-)