Re: PG 19 release notes and authors

On Sat, Apr 4, 2026 at 10:13 PM Bruce Momjian <bruce(at)momjian(dot)us> wrote:
> Yes, that was the original purpose.

I didn't actually know that. That's likely my own fault. (OTOH I
haven't actually used the new tag at all, at least not yet.)

> Basically, if a commit has no
> "Author" tag, the committer is assumed to be the author. If there is an
> "Author" tag, the committer is not assumed to be the author. If there
> is an Author tag and the committer wants author credit, they must add
> their name as an author. If the committer wants to indicate they
> changed the patch, and potentially added bugs, but doesn't want credit,
> the wiki says to use Co-authored-by.

Got it. That makes sense to me (obviously, since I already said that
that's the only policy that could possibly be useful).

> > What I'm saying here boils down to this: I don't think it's sensible
> > to expect the use of a specific tag variant (or even the order in
> > which author names appear) to convey much useful information. I really
> > hope nobody reads too much into my choices in this area.
>
> Well, I don't care what we decide, but we should decide something. You
> can say they don't convey information, but I need to put something in
> the release notes, so they are forced to have some effect.

I think that Co-authored-by should either: 1. have a specific
mechanical purpose (like affecting how the release notes are written),
OR 2. not exist at all.

What's the point, otherwise? It just doesn't make sense to have a
Co-authored-by that merely conveys a general vibe. These things are
inherently squishy and subjective. Pretending otherwise would be a
mistake (to be clear I'm not suggesting that you or anybody else has
made that mistake).

--
Peter Geoghegan