Re: [PATCH] wifi: wilc1000: change firmware path from 'atmel' to 'microchip/wilc'

[Kalle Valo <kvalo@kernel.org>]

<Ajay.Kathat@microchip.com> writes:

> On 7/19/23 03:37, Kalle Valo wrote:
>
>> Jakub Kicinski <kuba@kernel.org> writes:
>> 
>>>> In order to address scenario#1, a fallback method that loads the FW from
>>>> the older path(/atmel) can be added in the driver. I think that change
>>>> will make it compatible for scenario#1.
>>>> Please suggest, if there is a generic/recommended approach to handle
>>>> backward compatibility for FW path change.
>>>
>>> I'm afraid you need to request from both new and old patch for some
>>> time. Push the change to linux-firmware, but make driver be compatible
>>> with both for maybe three full releases? Then the risk of someone still
>>> having stale linux-firmware goes down quite a bit.
>> 
>> I would say at least minimum of two years, preferably more to make it
>> possible to upgrade kernel on LTS distro releases.
>> 
>>> TBH renaming FW paths, much like renaming drivers is usually more risk
>>> than reward.
>> 
>> I agree, it's just extra work without no actually benefit. Maybe an
>> exception here is iwlwifi, that should be fixed as that clutters the top
>> level firmware directory with dozens of files:
>> 
>
> Definitely, this change will not have any functionality improvements. It
> will just help to organize the wilc firmware directory structure.
>
> Currently, only wilc1000 firmwares are present in linux-firmware but the
> work to support wilc3000 and wilc's next-gen device is in progress. The
> existing wilc driver will be extended and the new firmware files needs
> to be added to linux-firmware. After this change, the all firmware's can
> organized under same root directory since adding a new device firmware's
> under 'atmel' folder may not make sense.

'atmel' is only a name, I wouldn't worry about that too much. For
example we still have drivers/net/wireless/ath even though Atheros is
long gone.

> Alternatively, the new device firmware(e.g wilc3000) can be added to
> '/microchip/wilc' without changing wilc1000 firmware path. Is this
> approach okay.

I haven't seen the actual patches but in principle having a new
directory 'microchip/wilc/ in linux-firmare sounds like a good idea to
me. But better to wait for comments from others for a while before
submitting anything.

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