Re: [coreboot] links in commit messages: don't do it.

[ron minnich]

On Tue, Oct 15, 2013 at 7:28 PM, WANG Siyuan  wrote:
> The driver download url has changed......It was not this page when I
> push this patch.

Thank you for that information! I think we may have now achieved a new
record, in which the  URL became obsolete *after* the commit was
uploaded for review but *before* it was approved :-)

I am used to web sites changing quickly. I think when a web site
changes this quickly, it only makes the argument against putting URLs
in commit messages even stronger.

I also did a simple test. Just putting this search term in
Ubuntu 13.04 with AMD Catalyst 13.4 Proprietary Linux Display Driver
which was in the commit message,
immediately got me to much more useful information than the URL. And,
as the years go by, the search term will be more and more useful, and
the URL less and less useful. Just

While it is true that URLs were great in the early days of the web,
they predate search engines and the data-centric internet we live in
today. As a means of locating information they are frequently obsolete
or misleading. Time moves on.

So, I repeat: please don't put URLs in the commit message, and we
won't have to go through the trouble of removing them. If you really
want to leave URLs somewhere, put them in the review comments on
gerrit, but just be aware that they may become obsolete surprisingly
quickly. I must admit, in this case, I was surprised just how quickly.

Thanks all

ron