[PATCH] wireless: orphan ipw2x00 drivers

[PATCH] wireless: orphan ipw2x00 drivers

[Zhu Yi]

Signed-off-by: Zhu Yi <yi.zhu@intel.com>
---
Please let us know if someone is interested in maintaining these drivers.

 MAINTAINERS |   10 ++--------
 1 files changed, 2 insertions(+), 8 deletions(-)

diff --git a/MAINTAINERS b/MAINTAINERS
index 6d119c9..bef7c1a 100644
--- a/MAINTAINERS
+++ b/MAINTAINERS
@@ -2978,20 +2978,14 @@ F:	drivers/net/ixgb/
 F:	drivers/net/ixgbe/
 
 INTEL PRO/WIRELESS 2100 NETWORK CONNECTION SUPPORT
-M:	Reinette Chatre <reinette.chatre@intel.com>
-M:	Intel Linux Wireless <ilw@linux.intel.com>
 L:	linux-wireless@vger.kernel.org
-W:	http://ipw2100.sourceforge.net
-S:	Odd Fixes
+S:	Orphan
 F:	Documentation/networking/README.ipw2100
 F:	drivers/net/wireless/ipw2x00/ipw2100.*
 
 INTEL PRO/WIRELESS 2915ABG NETWORK CONNECTION SUPPORT
-M:	Reinette Chatre <reinette.chatre@intel.com>
-M:	Intel Linux Wireless <ilw@linux.intel.com>
 L:	linux-wireless@vger.kernel.org
-W:	http://ipw2200.sourceforge.net
-S:	Odd Fixes
+S:	Orphan
 F:	Documentation/networking/README.ipw2200
 F:	drivers/net/wireless/ipw2x00/ipw2200.*
 
-- 
1.6.3.3

Re: [PATCH] wireless: orphan ipw2x00 drivers

[John W. Linville]

On Thu, Jun 10, 2010 at 09:44:29AM +0800, Zhu Yi wrote:
> Signed-off-by: Zhu Yi <yi.zhu@intel.com>
> ---
> Please let us know if someone is interested in maintaining these drivers.

Any chance of getting some hardware/firmware documentation?

John
-- 
John W. Linville                Someday the world will need a hero, and you
linville@tuxdriver.com                  might be all we have.  Be ready.

Re: [PATCH] wireless: orphan ipw2x00 drivers

[David Miller]

From: "John W. Linville" <linville@tuxdriver.com>
Date: Wed, 9 Jun 2010 21:45:47 -0400

> On Thu, Jun 10, 2010 at 09:44:29AM +0800, Zhu Yi wrote:
>> Signed-off-by: Zhu Yi <yi.zhu@intel.com>
>> ---
>> Please let us know if someone is interested in maintaining these drivers.
> 
> Any chance of getting some hardware/firmware documentation?

Indeed.

I'm extremely disappointed that the only organization currently even
capable of fixing low level bugs in these drivers no longer is willing
to do so.

If documentation can't be provided so that others can maintain this
driver (not just few specific people, because some day those folks
might tire of maintaining this too) that would be a serious crime.

Re: [PATCH] wireless: orphan ipw2x00 drivers

[reinette chatre]

On Wed, 2010-06-09 at 22:52 -0700, David Miller wrote:
> From: "John W. Linville" <linville@tuxdriver.com>
> Date: Wed, 9 Jun 2010 21:45:47 -0400
> 
> > On Thu, Jun 10, 2010 at 09:44:29AM +0800, Zhu Yi wrote:
> >> Signed-off-by: Zhu Yi <yi.zhu@intel.com>
> >> ---
> >> Please let us know if someone is interested in maintaining these drivers.
> > 
> > Any chance of getting some hardware/firmware documentation?
> 
> Indeed.
> 
> I'm extremely disappointed that the only organization currently even
> capable of fixing low level bugs in these drivers no longer is willing
> to do so.

This is not the situation. We recently lost all expertise with these
drivers and are unable to maintain them respectfully anymore.

If we continue to have the MAINTAINERS file commit us to "Odd fixes" we
are still responsible for reviewing/acknowledging patches, answering
community questions related to the driver, and looking into at least
critical bugs. Unfortunately we now have no ability to do any of these
tasks and surely not any better that members from the community (some of
whom actually know these drivers better than any of the people left here
at Intel).

This is why we changed the status to "Orphaned" since it really seem to
reflect our status at this time. We really do not know what else to do. 

I understand that there is a concern with low level bugs for which
hardware documentation may be needed. We surely will do our best to help
out when these situations arise. 

> If documentation can't be provided so that others can maintain this
> driver (not just few specific people, because some day those folks
> might tire of maintaining this too) that would be a serious crime.

We are unable to release this documentation, but are looking into our
options at this time. With groups disbanded this will take some time.

Reinette

Re: [PATCH] wireless: orphan ipw2x00 drivers

[Joe Perches]

On Fri, 2010-06-11 at 10:47 -0700, reinette chatre wrote:
> This is why we changed the status to "Orphaned" since it really seem to
> reflect our status at this time. We really do not know what else to do. 
> 
> I understand that there is a concern with low level bugs for which
> hardware documentation may be needed. We surely will do our best to help
> out when these situations arise. 

The S: line is just a guide.

Maybe change it to something more descriptive like:

S:	Orphaned, might dig up moldy faxed copies of hardware docs

Re: [PATCH] wireless: orphan ipw2x00 drivers

[reinette chatre]

On Fri, 2010-06-11 at 11:05 -0700, Joe Perches wrote:
> On Fri, 2010-06-11 at 10:47 -0700, reinette chatre wrote:
> > This is why we changed the status to "Orphaned" since it really seem to
> > reflect our status at this time. We really do not know what else to do. 
> > 
> > I understand that there is a concern with low level bugs for which
> > hardware documentation may be needed. We surely will do our best to help
> > out when these situations arise. 
> 
> The S: line is just a guide.
> 
> Maybe change it to something more descriptive like:
> 
> S:	Orphaned, might dig up moldy faxed copies of hardware docs
> 

That would be ideal if we can have some custom text in this file. We
actually looked into this but found that the different status field
values are currently used strictly by all entries in MAINTAINERS. Not
knowing what parses these files we stuck with the current style.

Reinette

Re: [PATCH] wireless: orphan ipw2x00 drivers

[David Miller]

From: reinette chatre <reinette.chatre@intel.com>
Date: Fri, 11 Jun 2010 10:47:47 -0700

> On Wed, 2010-06-09 at 22:52 -0700, David Miller wrote:
>> If documentation can't be provided so that others can maintain this
>> driver (not just few specific people, because some day those folks
>> might tire of maintaining this too) that would be a serious crime.
> 
> We are unable to release this documentation, but are looking into our
> options at this time. With groups disbanded this will take some time.

And people wonder why we push vendors so damn hard to release chip
documentation even when the vendor has an upstream friendly set of
developers maintaining the code at least at the beginning.

It's exactly because stuff like this can and does happen.  And with
the plethora of devices with drivers in the tree now, expect the
number of times this happens to escalate in the future rather than
decrease.

We're powerless without those documents, and at the mercy of what
you guys end up deciding to do.  That doesn't work.

Re: [PATCH] wireless: orphan ipw2x00 drivers

[reinette chatre]

On Wed, 2010-06-09 at 18:44 -0700, Zhu Yi wrote:
> Signed-off-by: Zhu Yi <yi.zhu@intel.com>

Not sure if it is needed but the sourceforge pages will still have the
firmware available for download. We are in process of cleaning those
pages up.

Signed-off-by: Reinette Chatre <reinette.chatre@intel.com>

Reinette

Re: [PATCH] wireless: orphan ipw2x00 drivers

[maximilian attems]

On Thu, 10 Jun 2010, reinette chatre wrote:

> On Wed, 2010-06-09 at 18:44 -0700, Zhu Yi wrote:
> > Signed-off-by: Zhu Yi <yi.zhu@intel.com>
> 
> Not sure if it is needed but the sourceforge pages will still have the
> firmware available for download. We are in process of cleaning those
> pages up.

while you are at it:
it be cool to have the firmware license also "cleaned up" to allow
at least distribution.

thanks

Re: [PATCH] wireless: orphan ipw2x00 drivers

[reinette chatre]

On Wed, 2010-06-23 at 09:33 -0700, maximilian attems wrote:
> On Thu, 10 Jun 2010, reinette chatre wrote:
> 
> > On Wed, 2010-06-09 at 18:44 -0700, Zhu Yi wrote:
> > > Signed-off-by: Zhu Yi <yi.zhu@intel.com>
> > 
> > Not sure if it is needed but the sourceforge pages will still have the
> > firmware available for download. We are in process of cleaning those
> > pages up.
> 
> while you are at it:
> it be cool to have the firmware license also "cleaned up" to allow
> at least distribution.

Please see http://ipw2100.sourceforge.net/firmware_faq.php

Reinette

Re: [PATCH] wireless: orphan ipw2x00 drivers

[maximilian attems]

On Wed, Jun 23, 2010 at 09:42:05AM -0700, reinette chatre wrote:
> On Wed, 2010-06-23 at 09:33 -0700, maximilian attems wrote:
> > On Thu, 10 Jun 2010, reinette chatre wrote:
> > 
> > > On Wed, 2010-06-09 at 18:44 -0700, Zhu Yi wrote:
> > > > Signed-off-by: Zhu Yi <yi.zhu@intel.com>
> > > 
> > > Not sure if it is needed but the sourceforge pages will still have the
> > > firmware available for download. We are in process of cleaning those
> > > pages up.
> > 
> > while you are at it:
> > it be cool to have the firmware license also "cleaned up" to allow
> > at least distribution.
> 
> Please see http://ipw2100.sourceforge.net/firmware_faq.php

I know that strange page and we (Debian) adhere to it.

still sad that you don't care to change it now that you don't care
anymore about the driver.