I tried to run the checkpatch.pl script as follows: scripts/checkpatch.pl -f drivers/hwmon/dell-smm-hwmon.c And I noticed this kind of warnings: WARNING: Missing a blank line after declarations #122: FILE: drivers/hwmon/dell-smm-hwmon.c:122: + unsigned int eax; + unsigned int ebx __packed; WARNING: Missing a blank line after declarations #123: FILE: drivers/hwmon/dell-smm-hwmon.c:123: + unsigned int ebx __packed; + unsigned int ecx __packed; The offending code looks like this: struct smm_regs { unsigned int eax; unsigned int ebx __packed; unsigned int ecx __packed; unsigned int edx __packed; unsigned int esi __packed; unsigned int edi __packed; }; It looks like a false positive as it excepts a blank line after every struct field declaration. Should it be reported to the checkpatch.pl maintainers?