Comment 2 for bug 1114984

I think there are two options how to fix this:

1. Catch the exception and make the autoland.py command to exit with 1 (i.e. the generic-land job will fail and will indicate a problem).

The issue from https://code.launchpad.net/~mrazik/jenkins-launchpad-plugin/stale-locks-take2/+merge/166452 will be therefore generating a bit of noise (but not too much as this should really happen very rarely).

Merge proposals that are still Approved but should be Merged (i.e. launchpad didn't detect the merge correctly) will stay Approved with no additional information. OTOH the generic-land job will fail (so indicating there is a failure) as well as the "check for stalled MPs" job. This will need a manual interaction and changing the job state to "Merged".

2. Catch the exception and make a comment in the merge proposal. For example:
"Merging reported a Pointless merge. This branch is most likely merged already. Please check if it is indeed the case and change the state to Merged manually."

The issue from stale-locks-take2 branch would then generate a bit of noise directly on the merge proposal (possibly confusing devs).

In the 2nd case (merged branch which was not detected as merged) it will give a bit more hint to the developers and people who are not watching the "check for stalled MPs" job will be able to correct the issue.