Linux Kernel patch submission checklist¶
Here are some basic things that developers should do if they want to see their kernel patch submissions accepted more quickly.
These are all above and beyond the documentation that is provided in Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst and elsewhere regarding submitting Linux kernel patches.
If you use a facility then #include the file that defines/declares that facility. Don't depend on other header files pulling in ones that you use.
Builds cleanly:
with applicable or modified
CONFIG
options=y
,=m
, and=n
. Nogcc
warnings/errors, no linker warnings/errors.Passes
allnoconfig
,allmodconfig
Builds successfully when using
O=builddir
Any Documentation/ changes build successfully without new warnings/errors. Use
make htmldocs
ormake pdfdocs
to check the build and fix any issues.
Builds on multiple CPU architectures by using local cross-compile tools or some other build farm.
ppc64 is a good architecture for cross-compilation checking because it tends to use
unsigned long
for 64-bit quantities.Check your patch for general style as detailed in Documentation/process/coding-style.rst. Check for trivial violations with the patch style checker prior to submission (
scripts/checkpatch.pl
). You should be able to justify all violations that remain in your patch.Any new or modified
CONFIG
options do not muck up the config menu and default to off unless they meet the exception criteria documented inDocumentation/kbuild/kconfig-language.rst
Menu attributes: default value.All new
Kconfig
options have help text.Has been carefully reviewed with respect to relevant
Kconfig
combinations. This is very hard to get right with testing -- brainpower pays off here.Check cleanly with sparse.
Use
make checkstack
and fix any problems that it finds.Note
checkstack
does not point out problems explicitly, but any one function that uses more than 512 bytes on the stack is a candidate for change.Include kernel-doc to document global kernel APIs. (Not required for static functions, but OK there also.) Use
make htmldocs
ormake pdfdocs
to check the kernel-doc and fix any issues.Has been tested with
CONFIG_PREEMPT
,CONFIG_DEBUG_PREEMPT
,CONFIG_DEBUG_SLAB
,CONFIG_DEBUG_PAGEALLOC
,CONFIG_DEBUG_MUTEXES
,CONFIG_DEBUG_SPINLOCK
,CONFIG_DEBUG_ATOMIC_SLEEP
,CONFIG_PROVE_RCU
andCONFIG_DEBUG_OBJECTS_RCU_HEAD
all simultaneously enabled.Has been build- and runtime tested with and without
CONFIG_SMP
andCONFIG_PREEMPT.
All codepaths have been exercised with all lockdep features enabled.
All new
/proc
entries are documented underDocumentation/
All new kernel boot parameters are documented in
Documentation/admin-guide/kernel-parameters.rst
.All new module parameters are documented with
MODULE_PARM_DESC()
All new userspace interfaces are documented in
Documentation/ABI/
. SeeDocumentation/ABI/README
for more information. Patches that change userspace interfaces should be CCed to linux-api@vger.kernel.org.Has been checked with injection of at least slab and page-allocation failures. See
Documentation/fault-injection/
.If the new code is substantial, addition of subsystem-specific fault injection might be appropriate.
Newly-added code has been compiled with
gcc -W
(usemake KCFLAGS=-W
). This will generate lots of noise, but is good for finding bugs like "warning: comparison between signed and unsigned".Tested after it has been merged into the -mm patchset to make sure that it still works with all of the other queued patches and various changes in the VM, VFS, and other subsystems.
All memory barriers {e.g.,
barrier()
,rmb()
,wmb()
} need a comment in the source code that explains the logic of what they are doing and why.If any ioctl's are added by the patch, then also update
Documentation/userspace-api/ioctl/ioctl-number.rst
.If your modified source code depends on or uses any of the kernel APIs or features that are related to the following
Kconfig
symbols, then test multiple builds with the relatedKconfig
symbols disabled and/or=m
(if that option is available) [not all of these at the same time, just various/random combinations of them]:CONFIG_SMP
,CONFIG_SYSFS
,CONFIG_PROC_FS
,CONFIG_INPUT
,CONFIG_PCI
,CONFIG_BLOCK
,CONFIG_PM
,CONFIG_MAGIC_SYSRQ
,CONFIG_NET
,CONFIG_INET=n
(but latter withCONFIG_NET=y
).