[ovs-dev] Cover letters (was Re: [PATCH 0/7] Add OVS DPDK keep-alive functionality)

[Aaron Conole]

Ben Pfaff <blp at ovn.org> writes:

> On Mon, May 01, 2017 at 04:45:56PM -0400, Aaron Conole wrote:
>> Ben Pfaff <blp at ovn.org> writes:
>> ...
>> > I think it'd be even better to include measurements in one of the commit
>> > messages, because those are available in the repository after the
>> > patches are applied.  It's harder to find cover letters because they're
>> > only on the mailing list.
>> 
>> One thing that other projects do to keep the cover letters is to create
>> a branch, apply all the patches from the series, and then create a merge
>> commit, with the commit message as the cover letter.  It can make the
>> history a bit messier, but means that the cover letter is retained, and
>> makes 'git bisect' work quite a bit better (because bisect knows how to
>> skip merged trees appropriately).  It could be worth doing, because it
>> can help to explain an overall motivation for a series when walking the
>> tree with git annotations.
>
> I wouldn't object to that, for well-organized series.
>
> Is there a way to automate applying a branch like this from email?  Or
> is it better to do them as pull requests (whether via email or Github)?

I think patchwork provides access to the cover letter somehow.  I've
CC'd Stephen because he has a bit of experience with PW, and may be able
to comment on whether or not I'm just crazy.