[Python-Dev] Small bug -- direct check-in allowed?

[Tim Peters]

[Armin Rigo]
> Just asking because I'm not sure about this rule: is it ok if I just
> make a check-in without first posting a SF bug or patch report for
> small bugs with an obvious solution ?

Even large bugs.  The question is much more whether it's likely that the
change will be controversial.  If you're an expert in an area, and want to
fix what's obviously a bug, without introducing another bug in the process,
and in a way that's obviously an improvement, it's not going to be
controversial, and everyone saves time and effort if you just do it.  Some
of those "obviously"s may be obvious only *to* an expert in the area, but
that's OK too -- the non-experts in the area wouldn't follow a report or
discussion anyway.

> In this case:
>
> >>> import heapq
> >>> heapq.heappop(5)
> Segmentation fault

It depends on what you do.  If, for example, you created a new standard
SegfaultError exception, and used a platform-specific memory protection
gimmick to raise that instead on your box but not others, you could
reasonably expect that to be a controversial change on at least two counts.
Then you should bring it up for discussion before doing it.

If instead you want to say that, in this context, an integer N should act
the same way as range(N) would have acted, and have heappop return 0, then
you'd be judged insane if you checked that in, and I'd probably revoke your
checkin privileges for your own good <wink>.

If you want to raise TypeError in this case, great, just do it.