-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA512 Hi all, I'm concerned that in some cases [1] we merge patches in stable branches before they reach master. My understanding is that in general such approach may lead to multiple kinds of issues: 1. if a master patch is not merged in the end due to negative review feedback, we will need to cope with a stable-only patch. 2. if a master patch is modified later before its merge, we need to cope with the need to apply last minute modifications to stable branches. In the worst cases, the difference won't even be noticed, and we'll result in unneeded differences between master and stable code. 3. also, if a patch is merged into e.g. havana and not icehouse, and then a user upgrades to icehouse, he will see a regression due to the missing patch that was once fixed in a prev-stable release. We could say that there are some cases where the strict ordering of backports is not applicable, like in [1]. Quoting Thierry, " @Ihar: stable branch changes come in two categories. There are project bugfixes (which are straight backports of stuff that has to land in master to ensure we have no regression) and infrastructure patches (to keep the test infrastructure working on stable branches). The latter do NOT have to land in master: in most cases, they are not even applicable there. This is basically a branch-specific infrastructure patch to keep the stable branch running. The fact that it has a master "equivalent" is more of a coincidence. Not having that patch in master wouldn't be a regression. To answer your question, if the patch has to be reworked, that would result in subsequent patchsets. " So some cases are not affected by problem (3), but still, (1) and (2) apply. I understand that in some cases we should not wait for long, like security fixes or infrastructure being broken right now. Though the case in question is not the latter (the infrastructure will become broken only if infra team enables latest tox without making sure all the branches are properly patched). So I think the following quote by Sean is not correct: "stable/* is going to be horribly broken if this doesn't land. We could let all the stable branches die, but I don't think that's sane." ...and hence, the rush with which we're pushing those patches into stable branches is not justified. I would like to hear from all of you on the matter, and I'm going to update our stable workflow rules based on your feedback. Comments? [1]: https://review.openstack.org/#/c/109750/ /Ihar -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG/MacGPG2 v2.0.22 (Darwin) Comment: Using GnuPG with Thunderbird - http://www.enigmail.net/ iQEcBAEBCgAGBQJT5H1TAAoJEC5aWaUY1u57pOAH/2xFM3aC6J2juFGth4Z6bPsV le0gjz7bWl1KyTgyBBkD0LsZbkOg1UdKL5Vrg5Ua4iT0j2NP+Q6QCy/AuR94cGko v5n1AuQm8YQxB1wQAmuG8xG2YAHtiX7gx/5Kw/kIZgkVdd8UHQXp28dBwu9td1+k TLo7MfJ7jde/BAlB6OLCrPC7yctog4xANrZOYw3u2tzVqh4YK7o67QceAVKcNIW6 EgVTSF+f6SyzJYMHKB58kusLFMmmNQDCdL0/gqoJ3qgPMA5ASh6ZjXzFfVggR5pT UnqEJ+0yN47RzRWaH6KlAhhVDW7EwKJwgvlggr8dwnA7ei/TYDWqunsEQ4Wcbmk= =JXuG -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----