Noob question: Development Environment

Noob question: Development Environment

[Paul Stoaks]

Greetings.  Sorry to interrupt with a newbie question, but I need some help
on setting up a linux wireless development and test environment.  What I
would like to have is a stable development and test environment where I can
work for a period of months without having to upgrade the kernel version on
my development and test machines, but staying close to the bleeding edge
with the core wireless modules and drivers.

I have successfully built the wireless-testing tree from GIT, but have only
discovered how to install the entire kernel produced from the build, not
just the wireless modules.  What I would like to do is to install only the
wireless modules, as I can do with the compat-wireless tree.  I have gotten
compat-wireless to work for me with a lot of labor (refreshing patches), but
I'm unsure of the correct work-flow with it.

How are you folks accomplishing this?

Please feel free to point me to the archives or a web page.  I've groped all
around the internet and have failed to answer my questions.  (If you point
me to the archives, please give me a keyword to search on as I have looked
and been unsuccessful in finding the relevant information.)

Thank you very much!
Paul Stoaks

Re: Noob question: Development Environment

[Thomas Pedersen]

Hi Paul,

On Mon, Nov 12, 2012 at 9:49 AM, Paul Stoaks <paul@foresight-mands.com> wrote:
> Greetings.  Sorry to interrupt with a newbie question, but I need some help
> on setting up a linux wireless development and test environment.  What I
> would like to have is a stable development and test environment where I can
> work for a period of months without having to upgrade the kernel version on
> my development and test machines, but staying close to the bleeding edge
> with the core wireless modules and drivers.
>
> I have successfully built the wireless-testing tree from GIT, but have only
> discovered how to install the entire kernel produced from the build, not
> just the wireless modules.  What I would like to do is to install only the
> wireless modules, as I can do with the compat-wireless tree.  I have gotten
> compat-wireless to work for me with a lot of labor (refreshing patches), but
> I'm unsure of the correct work-flow with it.
>
> How are you folks accomplishing this?

Please see [0] and especially [1] under the section "Generating stable
releases".

Hope this does what you want.
Thomas

[0] https://backports.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/Documentation/compat-drivers
[1] https://backports.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/Documentation/compat-drivers/hacking

Re: Noob question: Development Environment

[Javier Cardona]

Hi Paul,

On Mon, Nov 12, 2012 at 10:13 AM, Thomas Pedersen <thomas@cozybit.com> wrote:
> Hi Paul,
>
> On Mon, Nov 12, 2012 at 9:49 AM, Paul Stoaks <paul@foresight-mands.com> wrote:
>> (...)
>> What I would like to have is a stable development and test environment where I can
>> work for a period of months without having to upgrade the kernel version on
>> my development and test machines, but staying close to the bleeding edge
>> with the core wireless modules and drivers.

Maybe running the latest kernel inside a virtual machine can be a good
solution; it all depends on the type of development you intend to do.
For instance we attach usb wireless cards to our virtualized guests to
test them with the latest kernels.  Here is a distro that we maintain
just for this type of virtualized development:
https://github.com/cozybit/distro11s

Cheers,

Javier

-- 
Javier Cardona
cozybit Inc.
http://www.cozybit.com

RE: Noob question: Development Environment

[Paul Stoaks]

Hello Javier,

I think that's a fantastic approach, and I have successfully built
distro11s, but I was hoping for something a little less exotic using
equipment I had on hand to start with.  My journey over this last week has
been very educational but I was left with lots of holes in my understanding,
hence my question.

I have some USB devices on order and will likely switch over to the VM
approach before long.  (Although I may take a detour into simulation for a
bit.)

Thanks, Thomas for your pointer to the compat-drivers pages.  I had been to
the old one, but there looks to be some info here that I had missed.

So much to learn, so little time!
Paul


-----Original Message-----
From: Javier Cardona [mailto:javier@cozybit.com] 
Sent: Monday, November 12, 2012 10:27 AM
To: paul@foresight-mands.com
Cc: linux-wireless@vger.kernel.org; Thomas Pedersen
Subject: Re: Noob question: Development Environment

Hi Paul,

On Mon, Nov 12, 2012 at 10:13 AM, Thomas Pedersen <thomas@cozybit.com>
wrote:
> Hi Paul,
>
> On Mon, Nov 12, 2012 at 9:49 AM, Paul Stoaks <paul@foresight-mands.com>
wrote:
>> (...)
>> What I would like to have is a stable development and test 
>> environment where I can work for a period of months without having to 
>> upgrade the kernel version on my development and test machines, but 
>> staying close to the bleeding edge with the core wireless modules and
drivers.

Maybe running the latest kernel inside a virtual machine can be a good
solution; it all depends on the type of development you intend to do.
For instance we attach usb wireless cards to our virtualized guests to test
them with the latest kernels.  Here is a distro that we maintain just for
this type of virtualized development:
https://github.com/cozybit/distro11s

Cheers,

Javier

--
Javier Cardona
cozybit Inc.
http://www.cozybit.com