ACPI: Add documentation describing ACPICA release automation

This patch documents the ACPICA release automation.

Signed-off-by: Lv Zheng <lv.zheng@intel.com>
[ rjw: Editorial changes ]
Signed-off-by: Rafael J. Wysocki <rafael.j.wysocki@intel.com>

1 files changed, 262 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/Documentation/acpi/linuxized-acpica.txt b/Documentation/acpi/linuxized-acpica.txt
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+Linuxized ACPICA - Introduction to ACPICA Release Automation
+
+Copyright (C) 2013-2016, Intel Corporation
+Author: Lv Zheng <lv.zheng@intel.com>
+
+
+Abstract:
+
+This document describes the ACPICA project and the relationship between
+ACPICA and Linux.  It also describes how ACPICA code in drivers/acpi/acpica,
+include/acpi and tools/power/acpi is automatically updated to follow the
+upstream.
+
+
+1. ACPICA Project
+
+   The ACPI Component Architecture (ACPICA) project provides an operating
+   system (OS)-independent reference implementation of the Advanced
+   Configuration and Power Interface Specification (ACPI).  It has been
+   adapted by various host OSes.  By directly integrating ACPICA, Linux can
+   also benefit from the application experiences of ACPICA from other host
+   OSes.
+
+   The homepage of ACPICA project is: www.acpica.org, it is maintained and
+   supported by Intel Corporation.
+
+   The following figure depicts the Linux ACPI subystem where the ACPICA
+   adaptation is included:
+
+      +---------------------------------------------------------+
+      |                                                         |
+      |   +---------------------------------------------------+ |
+      |   | +------------------+                              | |
+      |   | | Table Management |                              | |
+      |   | +------------------+                              | |
+      |   | +----------------------+                          | |
+      |   | | Namespace Management |                          | |
+      |   | +----------------------+                          | |
+      |   | +------------------+       ACPICA Components      | |
+      |   | | Event Management |                              | |
+      |   | +------------------+                              | |
+      |   | +---------------------+                           | |
+      |   | | Resource Management |                           | |
+      |   | +---------------------+                           | |
+      |   | +---------------------+                           | |
+      |   | | Hardware Management |                           | |
+      |   | +---------------------+                           | |
+      | +---------------------------------------------------+ | |
+      | | |                            +------------------+ | | |
+      | | |                            | OS Service Layer | | | |
+      | | |                            +------------------+ | | |
+      | | +-------------------------------------------------|-+ |
+      | |   +--------------------+                          |   |
+      | |   | Device Enumeration |                          |   |
+      | |   +--------------------+                          |   |
+      | |   +------------------+                            |   |
+      | |   | Power Management |                            |   |
+      | |   +------------------+     Linux/ACPI Components  |   |
+      | |   +--------------------+                          |   |
+      | |   | Thermal Management |                          |   |
+      | |   +--------------------+                          |   |
+      | |   +--------------------------+                    |   |
+      | |   | Drivers for ACPI Devices |                    |   |
+      | |   +--------------------------+                    |   |
+      | |   +--------+                                      |   |
+      | |   | ...... |                                      |   |
+      | |   +--------+                                      |   |
+      | +---------------------------------------------------+   |
+      |                                                         |
+      +---------------------------------------------------------+
+
+                 Figure 1. Linux ACPI Software Components
+
+   NOTE:
+    A. OS Service Layer - Provided by Linux to offer OS dependent
+       implementation of the predefined ACPICA interfaces (acpi_os_*).
+         include/acpi/acpiosxf.h
+         drivers/acpi/osl.c
+         include/acpi/platform
+         include/asm/acenv.h
+    B. ACPICA Functionality - Released from ACPICA code base to offer
+       OS independent implementation of the ACPICA interfaces (acpi_*).
+         drivers/acpi/acpica
+         include/acpi/ac*.h
+         tools/power/acpi
+    C. Linux/ACPI Functionality - Providing Linux specific ACPI
+       functionality to the other Linux kernel subsystems and user space
+       programs.
+         drivers/acpi
+         include/linux/acpi.h
+         include/linux/acpi*.h
+         include/acpi
+         tools/power/acpi
+    D. Architecture Specific ACPICA/ACPI Functionalities - Provided by the
+       ACPI subsystem to offer architecture specific implementation of the
+       ACPI interfaces.  They are Linux specific components and are out of
+       the scope of this document.
+         include/asm/acpi.h
+         include/asm/acpi*.h
+         arch/*/acpi
+
+2. ACPICA Release
+
+   The ACPICA project maintains its code base at the following repository URL:
+   https://github.com/acpica/acpica.git. As a rule, a release is made every
+   month.
+
+   As the coding style adopted by the ACPICA project is not acceptable by
+   Linux, there is a release process to convert the ACPICA git commits into
+   Linux patches.  The patches generated by this process are referred to as
+   "linuxized ACPICA patches".  The release process is carried out on a local
+   copy the ACPICA git repository.  Each commit in the monthly release is
+   converted into a linuxized ACPICA patch.  Together, they form the montly
+   ACPICA release patchset for the Linux ACPI community.  This process is
+   illustrated in the following figure:
+
+    +-----------------------------+
+    | acpica / master (-) commits |
+    +-----------------------------+
+       /|\         |
+        |         \|/
+        |  /---------------------\    +----------------------+
+        | < Linuxize repo Utility >-->| old linuxized acpica |--+
+        |  \---------------------/    +----------------------+  |
+        |                                                       |
+     /---------\                                                |
+    < git reset >                                                \
+     \---------/                                                  \
+       /|\                                                        /+-+
+        |                                                        /   |
+    +-----------------------------+                             |    |
+    | acpica / master (+) commits |                             |    |
+    +-----------------------------+                             |    |
+                   |                                            |    |
+                  \|/                                           |    |
+         /-----------------------\    +----------------------+  |    |
+        < Linuxize repo Utilities >-->| new linuxized acpica |--+    |
+         \-----------------------/    +----------------------+       |
+                                                                    \|/
+    +--------------------------+                  /----------------------\
+    | Linuxized ACPICA Patches |<----------------< Linuxize patch Utility >
+    +--------------------------+                  \----------------------/
+                   |
+                  \|/
+     /---------------------------\
+    < Linux ACPI Community Review >
+     \---------------------------/
+                   |
+                  \|/
+    +-----------------------+    /------------------\    +----------------+
+    | linux-pm / linux-next |-->< Linux Merge Window >-->| linux / master |
+    +-----------------------+    \------------------/    +----------------+
+
+                Figure 2. ACPICA -> Linux Upstream Process
+
+   NOTE:
+    A. Linuxize Utilities - Provided by the ACPICA repository, including a
+       utility located in source/tools/acpisrc folder and a number of
+       scripts located in generate/linux folder.
+    B. acpica / master - "master" branch of the git repository at
+       <https://github.com/acpica/acpica.git>.
+    C. linux-pm / linux-next - "linux-next" branch of the git repository at
+       <http://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/rafael/linux-pm.git>.
+    D. linux / master - "master" branch of the git repository at
+       <http://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git>.
+
+   Before the linuxized ACPICA patches are sent to the Linux ACPI community
+   for review, there is a quality ensurance build test process to reduce
+   porting issues.  Currently this build process only takes care of the
+   following kernel configuration options:
+   CONFIG_ACPI/CONFIG_ACPI_DEBUG/CONFIG_ACPI_DEBUGGER
+
+3. ACPICA Divergences
+
+   Ideally, all of the ACPICA commits should be converted into Linux patches
+   automatically without manual modifications, the "linux / master" tree should
+   contain the ACPICA code that exactly corresponds to the ACPICA code
+   contained in "new linuxized acpica" tree and it should be possible to run
+   the release process fully automatically.
+
+   As a matter of fact, however, there are source code differences between
+   the ACPICA code in Linux and the upstream ACPICA code, referred to as
+   "ACPICA Divergences".
+
+   The various sources of ACPICA divergences include:
+   1. Legacy divergences - Before the current ACPICA release process was
+      established, there already had been divergences between Linux and
+      ACPICA. Over the past several years those divergences have been greatly
+      reduced, but there still are several ones and it takes time to figure
+      out the underlying reasons for their existence.
+   2. Manual modifications - Any manual modification (eg. coding style fixes)
+      made directly in the Linux sources obviously hurts the ACPICA release
+      automation.  Thus it is recommended to fix such issues in the ACPICA
+      upstream source code and generate the linuxized fix using the ACPICA
+      release utilities (please refer to Section 4 below for the details).
+   3. Linux specific features - Sometimes it's impossible to use the
+      current ACPICA APIs to implement features required by the Linux kernel,
+      so Linux developers occasionaly have to change ACPICA code directly.
+      Those changes may not be acceptable by ACPICA upstream and in such cases
+      they are left as committed ACPICA divergences unless the ACPICA side can
+      implement new mechanisms as replacements for them.
+   4. ACPICA release fixups - ACPICA only tests commits using a set of the
+      user space simulation utilies, thus the linuxized ACPICA patches may
+      break the Linux kernel, leaving us build/boot failures.  In order to
+      avoid breaking Linux bisection, fixes are applied directly to the
+      linuxized ACPICA patches during the release process.  When the release
+      fixups are backported to the upstream ACPICA sources, they must follow
+      the upstream ACPICA rules and so further modifications may appear.
+      That may result in the appearance of new divergences.
+   5. Fast tracking of ACPICA commits - Some ACPICA commits are regression
+      fixes or stable-candidate material, so they are applied in advance with
+      respect to the ACPICA release process.  If such commits are reverted or
+      rebased on the ACPICA side in order to offer better solutions, new ACPICA
+      divergences are generated.
+
+4. ACPICA Development
+
+   This paragraph guides Linux developers to use the ACPICA upstream release
+   utilities to obtain Linux patches corresponding to upstream ACPICA commits
+   before they become available from the ACPICA release process.
+
+   1. Cherry-pick an ACPICA commit
+
+   First you need to git clone the ACPICA repository and the ACPICA change
+   you want to cherry pick must be committed into the local repository.
+
+   Then the gen-patch.sh command can help to cherry-pick an ACPICA commit
+   from the ACPICA local repository:
+
+   $ git clone https://github.com/acpica/acpica
+   $ cd acpica
+   $ generate/linux/gen-patch.sh -u [commit ID]
+
+   Here the commit ID is the ACPICA local repository commit ID you want to
+   cherry pick.  It can be omitted if the commit is "HEAD".
+
+   2. Cherry-pick recent ACPICA commits
+
+   Sometimes you need to rebase your code on top of the most recent ACPICA
+   changes that haven't been applied to Linux yet.
+
+   You can generate the ACPICA release series yourself and rebase your code on
+   top of the generated ACPICA release patches:
+
+   $ git clone https://github.com/acpica/acpica
+   $ cd acpica
+   $ generate/linux/make-patches.sh -u [commit ID]
+
+   The commit ID should be the last ACPICA commit accepted by Linux.  Usually,
+   it is the commit modifying ACPI_CA_VERSION.  It can be found by executing
+   "git blame source/include/acpixf.h" and referencing the line that contains
+   "ACPI_CA_VERSION".
+
+   3. Inspect the current divergences
+
+   If you have local copies of both Linux and upstream ACPICA, you can generate
+   a diff file indicating the state of the current divergences:
+
+   # git clone https://github.com/acpica/acpica
+   # git clone http://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git
+   # cd acpica
+   # generate/linux/divergences.sh -s ../linux