[webkit-dev] Proposal: Commit messages should start with a one-line summary of the change

[Adam Roben]

On Jun 30, 2011, at 7:52 PM, Darin Adler wrote:

> I don’t think it’s a good idea to add yet another thing to every change log entry.

I wouldn't consider this something being added. Most ChangeLog entries (the good ones, anyway) already contain a description of the fix in addition to the bug title, URL and reviewer. <http://trac.webkit.org/changeset/90086> is a good example. All I'm proposing is that part of the explanation of the fix be extracted out into a one-line summary at the top of the ChangeLog. So it's not so much adding something as rearranging the information that is (or should) already be present.

> I do think that given the tools behavior you described, we should move the reviewer text after the bug title and patch description paragraph, even though you explicitly said that’s not what you are proposing.

I think that would be a good first step. It would definitely be better than what we have now from a tools perspective. And in a lot of cases these days, the bug title really is a short description of the change. [1]

I think these two bugs will get us started:
<http://webkit.org/b/26755> webkit-patch's commit messages are less readable than commit-log-editor's
<http://webkit.org/b/63804> commit-log-editor reorders ChangeLog entries in unexpected ways

-Adam

1. I don't think this is necessarily a good thing; it would be better in my opinion if bug titles described user-visible symptoms or missing features. The typical webkit-patch-based workflow of writing a patch first and then uploading it to a new bug encourages these kinds of solution-based rather than issue-based bug titles. But webkit-patch makes so many things so much easier that it's hard to fault it!