Need help: Generating patch using git

[Amit Mehta]

> 
> You can remote track linux-next from your existing repo. (this is how
> I do it.) cd into your linux-2.6/ and do this;
> 
> $ git remote add linux-next
> git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/next/linux-next.git
> $ git fetch linux-next
> $ git fetch --tags linux-next
> 
> You will then be all set up to track linux-next.
> 
> Then, in the future, do 'git remote update' to update the linux-next
> branch so you get all the latest tags each time (this will also update
> any other remote branches you have set up to track).
> 
> Note that as I understand it linux-next isn't an 'evolving' tree like
> mainline, it's best to see it as being a list of individual kernels
> released as tags, i.e. you shouldn't be merging one into another.
> 
> Stephen Rothwell's notification on the linux-kernel mailing list about
> the latest release explains this and is probably worth a read:
> https://lkml.org/lkml/2012/2/1/20
> 
> 
> To list the tags, do:
> 
> $ git tag -l next-*
> 
> and the bottom one will be the latest linux-next version.
> 
> So in my repo, having just done a remote update, the last few tags
> look like this:
> 
> $ git tag -l next-*
> 
> <...>
> 
> next-20111215
> next-20111216
> next-20111221
> next-20111228
> next-20120113
> next-20120118
> next-20120201
> 
> The bottom one is the latest release so I can check out this tag, like
> so, (with accompanying message below:)
> 
> 
> 
> $ git checkout next-20120201
> Checking out files: 100% (2741/2741), done.
> Note: checking out 'next-20120201'.
> 
> You are in 'detached HEAD' state. You can look around, make experimental
> changes and commit them, and you can discard any commits you make in this
> state without impacting any branches by performing another checkout.
> 
> If you want to create a new branch to retain commits you create, you may
> do so (now or later) by using -b with the checkout command again. Example:
> 
>  git checkout -b new_branch_name
> 
> HEAD is now at bc7f599... Add linux-next specific files for 20120201
> 
> 
> 
> Then I can create a new branch from here, e.g.
> 
> $ git checkout -b 1st-feb-2012-next
> 
> Now I have my own branch to build a linux-next kernel, or work on, etc.
> 

I have followed the steps as mentioned above and I have created a new branch
which has some trivial changes. After this I ran "checkpatch.pl" script against
my patch, which reported no warning or error messages. I sent this patch to
myself and was able to apply this patch successfully(In past It didn't worked as
I was using gmail GUI client which does not work for sending patches, refer
Documentation/email-clients.txt). As this patch does nothing more than just
adding some missing loglevels for printks', hence I was wondering if I need to
go through the entire kernel build process and boot from the modified kernel and
do some tests before sending this patch to kernel-janitor mailing list and the
relevant maintainers. To be specific, my changes are under linux-next/net/ipv4
I've read SubmittingPatches but still I wish to know the general steps that one
should follow for "janitorial" related changes.

-Amit

P.S.
What i think is trivial can very much be substantial as well as I may not
perceive the effects as of now.