[patch 01/15] [makedist.diff] initial attempt at getting make dist to succeed

[Chris Shoemaker]

On Mon, Oct 10, 2005 at 03:20:13PM -0400, Derek Atkins wrote:
> Quoting Chris Shoemaker <c.shoemaker at cox.net>:
> 
> >On Mon, Oct 10, 2005 at 11:08:35AM -0400, Derek Atkins wrote:
> >>Chris,
> >>
> >>These patches are sent "inline" rather than as attachments..  You should 
> >>use
> >>attachments so that mailers don't munge the whitespace.
> >
> >That's kind of odd.  If my mailer munged whitespace, then I'd
> >certainly like to know, and I'd work to fix it.  But using attachments
> >seems like an awkward work-around for bad mailer behavior.  Using
> >attachments makes it very difficult to comment on the patch and also
> >inconvenient to handle with normal text-processing tools.
> 
> Really?  None of the tools I've ever used have a problem with it.  I 
> also don't
> think it's a bad workaround..  I find it quite easy to reply to 
> attachements,
> especially when they are sent with a proper mime-type.  At least /my/ mailer
> (Gnus) deals with that just fine.
> 
> >Most of the projects I work on would refuse attachments, preferring
> >inlines.
> 
> I don't know what projects you're involved in, but all the projects I've 
> been
> involved with insist on attachments and refuse inlines because mailers b0rk
> them too often.

LKML and Apache, e.g., both require inlines.  I tried in vain (for 5
min.) to google for a project that instructed submitters to attach,
but every instruction I found was for inlines only.

> 
> >Notice that the attachments would be to _empty_ bodies.  The entire
> >email body *is* the foo.diff file.  (patch ignores the comments up
> >front.)  I guess I could see a benefit to attachments if I sent them
> >all together in one email.
> 
> That's fine.  I don't see a problem with the attachment being an empty 
> body. Worst case you could just duplicate the subject in the message 
> text.
> 
> >Are there MUAs that will munge whitespace when saving an email to a
> >file?  If anyone wants a particular patch as an attachment, let me
> >know, and I'll send it offlist.
> 
> Perhaps, yes.  But there are MANY MTAs that will munge the messages in 
> transit. Are you sure that somewhere between you and me there isn't one 
> MTA that's going
> to do that?  Or between you and whoever it is that applie the patches?

This must be a myth.  Any MTA that altered whitespace would be so
broken no one would use it.  Inline patches only has been policy since
day 1 on lkml, so I think if there were problems with MTAs, I'd know.

OTOH, there are some MUA with default settings that munge whitespace,
(e.g. pine, I think).

That said, I find the many arguments for inlining compelling, but
haven't found any arguments for attachment.  Can you point me to
"Inline patches considered harmful", or some such?

-chris

> 
> >-chris
> 
> -derek
> 
> -- 
>       Derek Atkins, SB '93 MIT EE, SM '95 MIT Media Laboratory
>       Member, MIT Student Information Processing Board  (SIPB)
>       URL: http://web.mit.edu/warlord/    PP-ASEL-IA     N1NWH
>       warlord at MIT.EDU                        PGP key available
>