Wireless support

Wireless support

[Lee Revell]

Is the Linksys WUSB 54GS wireless adapter (FCCID Q87-WUSB54GS)
supported?

TIA,

Lee

Re: Wireless support

[Lee Revell]

On Sun, 2005-08-07 at 15:22 -0400, Lee Revell wrote:
> Is the Linksys WUSB 54GS wireless adapter (FCCID Q87-WUSB54GS)
> supported?
> 

Wow, Google has really declined in quality.  I got zero hits for
"Linksys WUSB 54G linux".  Then I found this page on my own.

(from http://ndiswrapper.sourceforge.net/mediawiki/index.php/List)

Card: Linksys #[WUSB54G], 802.11b/g, USB 2.0 -- [link here|List#WUSB54G] 
      * Chipset: Prism54
      * usbid: 5041:2234
      * Driver: Linksys Windows XP driver
        http://www.linksys.com/download/default.asp
      * Other: Works smoothly, of course ;) - this is the device the USB
        extension was originally developed for. WEP is running, WPA is
        supported using wpa_supplicant 0.2.5. No problems with both 1.1
        and 2.0 host controllers. As with many other USB devices, no
        success with 2.4 kernels so far. Try to use 2.6.7 or better.
        There is a native driver for Prism54 that is working on USB
        support. View its status at Prism54.org

Sorry for the WOB.  And if anyone from Google is reading, WTF?

Lee

Re: Wireless support

[Alejandro Bonilla Beeche]

On Sun, 2005-08-07 at 15:22 -0400, Lee Revell wrote:
> Is the Linksys WUSB 54GS wireless adapter (FCCID Q87-WUSB54GS)
> supported?
> 
> TIA,
> 
> Lee

Normally, linksys doesn't care much about Linux and they won't even
release info for a driver. Yeah, they have some open info for the WRT's
but the adapters are normally usable with ndiswrapper or Linuxant
driver.

IMHO, in reference to Wireless adapters, I would get already supported
ones.

.Alejandro

Re: Wireless support

[Lee Revell]

On Sun, 2005-08-07 at 18:39 -0600, Alejandro Bonilla Beeche wrote:
> On Sun, 2005-08-07 at 15:22 -0400, Lee Revell wrote:
> > Is the Linksys WUSB 54GS wireless adapter (FCCID Q87-WUSB54GS)
> > supported?
> > 
> > TIA,
> > 
> > Lee
> 
> Normally, linksys doesn't care much about Linux and they won't even
> release info for a driver. Yeah, they have some open info for the WRT's
> but the adapters are normally usable with ndiswrapper or Linuxant
> driver.
> 
> IMHO, in reference to Wireless adapters, I would get already supported
> ones.

Well, AFAICT it should be supported by the prism54 driver.  Is this not
the case?

Lee

Re: Wireless support

[Alejandro Bonilla Beeche]

On Sun, 2005-08-07 at 21:20 -0400, Lee Revell wrote:
> On Sun, 2005-08-07 at 18:39 -0600, Alejandro Bonilla Beeche wrote:
> > On Sun, 2005-08-07 at 15:22 -0400, Lee Revell wrote:
> > > Is the Linksys WUSB 54GS wireless adapter (FCCID Q87-WUSB54GS)
> > > supported?
> > > 
> > > TIA,
> > > 
> > > Lee
> > 
> > Normally, linksys doesn't care much about Linux and they won't even
> > release info for a driver. Yeah, they have some open info for the WRT's
> > but the adapters are normally usable with ndiswrapper or Linuxant
> > driver.
> > 
> > IMHO, in reference to Wireless adapters, I would get already supported
> > ones.
> 
> Well, AFAICT it should be supported by the prism54 driver.  Is this not
> the case?

http://linuxwifi.com/modules/wiwimod/?page=DeviceList

Apparently, looks like only the WUSB54G not the WUSB54GS. But that makes
me think that it should be supported soon by the prism54.

Maybe ask them if they have a clue, or if they have an experimental
patch to support it?

> Lee

Re: Wireless support

[Martin J. Bligh]

--Lee Revell <rlrevell@joe-job.com> wrote (on Sunday, August 07, 2005 15:56:06 -0400):

> On Sun, 2005-08-07 at 15:22 -0400, Lee Revell wrote:
>> Is the Linksys WUSB 54GS wireless adapter (FCCID Q87-WUSB54GS)
>> supported?
>> 
> 
> Wow, Google has really declined in quality.  I got zero hits for
> "Linksys WUSB 54G linux".  Then I found this page on my own.
> 
> (from http://ndiswrapper.sourceforge.net/mediawiki/index.php/List)
> 
> Card: Linksys #[WUSB54G], 802.11b/g, USB 2.0 -- [link here|List#WUSB54G] 
>       * Chipset: Prism54
>       * usbid: 5041:2234
>       * Driver: Linksys Windows XP driver
>         http://www.linksys.com/download/default.asp
>       * Other: Works smoothly, of course ;) - this is the device the USB
>         extension was originally developed for. WEP is running, WPA is
>         supported using wpa_supplicant 0.2.5. No problems with both 1.1
>         and 2.0 host controllers. As with many other USB devices, no
>         success with 2.4 kernels so far. Try to use 2.6.7 or better.
>         There is a native driver for Prism54 that is working on USB
>         support. View its status at Prism54.org
> 
> Sorry for the WOB.  And if anyone from Google is reading, WTF?

It doesn't actually say it works on Linux. Perhaps you wanted 
mysticgooglepsychic.com? ;-) 

I don't think it is reasonable to expect google to know what ndiswrapper 
is ... or perhaps it just has a taste filter installed? ;-)

M.

Re: Wireless support

[Denis Vlasenko]

On Monday 08 August 2005 03:39, Alejandro Bonilla Beeche wrote:
> On Sun, 2005-08-07 at 15:22 -0400, Lee Revell wrote:
> > Is the Linksys WUSB 54GS wireless adapter (FCCID Q87-WUSB54GS)
> > supported?
> 
> Normally, linksys doesn't care much about Linux and they won't even
> release info for a driver. Yeah, they have some open info for the WRT's
> but the adapters are normally usable with ndiswrapper or Linuxant
> driver.

The more I read this, the more I think about usefulness of blacklisting
ndiswrapper.
--
vda

Re: Wireless support

[Lee Revell]

On Mon, 2005-08-08 at 09:31 +0300, Denis Vlasenko wrote:
> On Monday 08 August 2005 03:39, Alejandro Bonilla Beeche wrote:
> > On Sun, 2005-08-07 at 15:22 -0400, Lee Revell wrote:
> > > Is the Linksys WUSB 54GS wireless adapter (FCCID Q87-WUSB54GS)
> > > supported?
> > 
> > Normally, linksys doesn't care much about Linux and they won't even
> > release info for a driver. Yeah, they have some open info for the WRT's
> > but the adapters are normally usable with ndiswrapper or Linuxant
> > driver.
> 
> The more I read this, the more I think about usefulness of blacklisting
> ndiswrapper.

What's your reasoning?  The technical aspect of the argument is obvious
(incompatible with 4K stacks) but the political side seems insolvable.
Wouldn't this leave thousands of users with non working hardware?

Lee 

Re: Wireless support

[Arjan van de Ven]

On Mon, 2005-08-08 at 13:48 -0400, Lee Revell wrote:
> On Mon, 2005-08-08 at 09:31 +0300, Denis Vlasenko wrote:
> > On Monday 08 August 2005 03:39, Alejandro Bonilla Beeche wrote:
> > > On Sun, 2005-08-07 at 15:22 -0400, Lee Revell wrote:
> > > > Is the Linksys WUSB 54GS wireless adapter (FCCID Q87-WUSB54GS)
> > > > supported?
> > > 
> > > Normally, linksys doesn't care much about Linux and they won't even
> > > release info for a driver. Yeah, they have some open info for the WRT's
> > > but the adapters are normally usable with ndiswrapper or Linuxant
> > > driver.
> > 
> > The more I read this, the more I think about usefulness of blacklisting
> > ndiswrapper.
> 
> What's your reasoning?  The technical aspect of the argument is obvious
> (incompatible with 4K stacks) but the political side seems insolvable.
> Wouldn't this leave thousands of users with non working hardware?\

arguably it doesn't really work with ndiswrapper either; only most of
the time (due to windows having a 12kb stack)... and it's effectively a
binary only kernel module.

it also provides a discentive for vendors to provide real linux
drivers....

Re: Wireless support

[Lee Revell]

On Sun, 2005-08-07 at 22:50 -0700, Martin J. Bligh wrote:
> It doesn't actually say it works on Linux. Perhaps you wanted 
> mysticgooglepsychic.com? ;-) 
> 
> I don't think it is reasonable to expect google to know what ndiswrapper 
> is ... or perhaps it just has a taste filter installed? ;-)

True, I also found that a large reason for the difficulty of googling
for Linux driver support info is that many projects that start as out of
tree drivers or reverse engineering efforts don't update their web sites
when the project ends with the driver being merged into the kernel (like
prism54.org).  So the web site still shows an incomplete list of
supported hardware leading users to think their newer hardware is
unsupported while in fact it probably works OOTB.

Of course it's easiest to just try it but I don't have the hardware on
hand...

Lee

Re: Wireless support

[Andreas Steinmetz]

Arjan van de Ven wrote:
> On Mon, 2005-08-08 at 13:48 -0400, Lee Revell wrote:
> 
>>On Mon, 2005-08-08 at 09:31 +0300, Denis Vlasenko wrote:
>>
>>>On Monday 08 August 2005 03:39, Alejandro Bonilla Beeche wrote:
>>>
>>>>On Sun, 2005-08-07 at 15:22 -0400, Lee Revell wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>Is the Linksys WUSB 54GS wireless adapter (FCCID Q87-WUSB54GS)
>>>>>supported?
>>>>
>>>>Normally, linksys doesn't care much about Linux and they won't even
>>>>release info for a driver. Yeah, they have some open info for the WRT's
>>>>but the adapters are normally usable with ndiswrapper or Linuxant
>>>>driver.
>>>
>>>The more I read this, the more I think about usefulness of blacklisting
>>>ndiswrapper.
>>
>>What's your reasoning?  The technical aspect of the argument is obvious
>>(incompatible with 4K stacks) but the political side seems insolvable.
>>Wouldn't this leave thousands of users with non working hardware?\
> 
> 
> arguably it doesn't really work with ndiswrapper either; only most of
> the time (due to windows having a 12kb stack)... and it's effectively a
> binary only kernel module.
> 
> it also provides a discentive for vendors to provide real linux
> drivers....
> 

Oh well,
I gave up on my laptop's built in Inprocomm IPN 2220 quite some time ago
(one more reason not to like Cisco). In the rare cases I do really need
wlan there is http://zd1211.sourceforge.net/

You can get it to work on x86_64. It currently has no wpa but I don't
care, IPSec is a proven solution. The code looks ugly but time will show
how it evolves. And about 40 EUR for the Longshine LCS-8170 802.11b/g
and Bluetooth 1.2 combo adapter isn't really expensive. The only
drawback is that it is another piece of external hardware to carry
around as well as some more laptop built in crap.
-- 
Andreas Steinmetz                       SPAMmers use robotrap@domdv.de

Re: Wireless support

[Lee Revell]

On Mon, 2005-08-08 at 20:13 +0200, Andreas Steinmetz wrote:
> I gave up on my laptop's built in Inprocomm IPN 2220 quite some time ago
> (one more reason not to like Cisco). In the rare cases I do really need
> wlan there is http://zd1211.sourceforge.net/

Any idea how much hardware is out there that needs ndiswrapper to work?

Lee

Re: Wireless support

[Andreas Steinmetz]

Lee Revell wrote:
> On Mon, 2005-08-08 at 20:13 +0200, Andreas Steinmetz wrote:
> 
>>I gave up on my laptop's built in Inprocomm IPN 2220 quite some time ago
>>(one more reason not to like Cisco). In the rare cases I do really need
>>wlan there is http://zd1211.sourceforge.net/
> 
> 
> Any idea how much hardware is out there that needs ndiswrapper to work?

No real idea but an educated guess: too much...

-- 
Andreas Steinmetz                       SPAMmers use robotrap@domdv.de

Re: Wireless support

[Lee Revell]

On Mon, 2005-08-08 at 20:24 +0200, Andreas Steinmetz wrote:
> Lee Revell wrote:
> > On Mon, 2005-08-08 at 20:13 +0200, Andreas Steinmetz wrote:
> > 
> >>I gave up on my laptop's built in Inprocomm IPN 2220 quite some time ago
> >>(one more reason not to like Cisco). In the rare cases I do really need
> >>wlan there is http://zd1211.sourceforge.net/
> > 
> > 
> > Any idea how much hardware is out there that needs ndiswrapper to work?
> 
> No real idea but an educated guess: too much...
> 

I like the idea of blacklisting anything with a native driver (even a
partially working one), but leaving alone the stuff that is completely
unsupported.

Lee

RE: Wireless support

[Alejandro Bonilla]

> > > Any idea how much hardware is out there that needs
> ndiswrapper to work?
> >
> > No real idea but an educated guess: too much...
> >
>
> I like the idea of blacklisting anything with a native driver (even a
> partially working one), but leaving alone the stuff that is completely
> unsupported.
>
> Lee

	The Point is!!! We like more Open Source, I use open Source hardware, I use
hardware that works in Linux, I use hardware were the manufacturer cares
about Linux. And people that use ndiswrapper is because the manufacturer
does not care about Linux.

	I wouldn't even buy hardware from people that think they don't need to make
Drivers or release info for Linux because most of his customers are using
Windows.

Again, the point is that ndiswrapper is a great project, but people uses it
for the leftovers! We *shouldn't* buy leftovers or from Manuf that don't
care about Linux.

.Alejandro

RE: Wireless support

[Lee Revell]

On Mon, 2005-08-08 at 12:56 -0600, Alejandro Bonilla wrote:
> Again, the point is that ndiswrapper is a great project, but people
> uses it for the leftovers! We *shouldn't* buy leftovers or from Manuf
> that don't care about Linux.

If you are always speccing out new systems then of course, but in the
real world I have some customers who need to dual boot and ideally it
would work on their existing hardware.  Linux is a harder sell if people
need to replace a lot of their gear.

Lee

RE: Wireless support

[linux-os (Dick Johnson)]

On Mon, 8 Aug 2005, Alejandro Bonilla wrote:

>>>> Any idea how much hardware is out there that needs
>> ndiswrapper to work?
>>>
>>> No real idea but an educated guess: too much...
>>>
>>
>> I like the idea of blacklisting anything with a native driver (even a
>> partially working one), but leaving alone the stuff that is completely
>> unsupported.
>>
>> Lee
>
> 	The Point is!!! We like more Open Source, I use open Source hardware, I use
> hardware that works in Linux, I use hardware were the manufacturer cares
> about Linux. And people that use ndiswrapper is because the manufacturer
> does not care about Linux.
>
> 	I wouldn't even buy hardware from people that think they don't need to make
> Drivers or release info for Linux because most of his customers are using
> Windows.
>
> Again, the point is that ndiswrapper is a great project, but people uses it
> for the leftovers! We *shouldn't* buy leftovers or from Manuf that don't
> care about Linux.
>
> .Alejandro

But for many, the emphasis is upon functionality. I should be able
to go to a "computer store" and pick up a WIFI device, plug it
in, and install the driver that comes with it. It may not
be the "optimum" solution, but it should work. You see, "Open
Source" is about politics (not meant to be a bad word), we need
to have stuff work first, then we can deal with politics. The
NDIS stuff is an excellent way to beat M$ with their own whip.
Also, the interface to the OS, with a proper NDIS Wrapper, can
protect against common coding problems like buffer-overwrites
and trashing memory. The only compatibility problems I see is
that NDIS code can do bad things in interrupts (like spin).
You can test for these compatibility issues and make a learned
cost v.s. performance trade-off. Right now, you can't test
what you don't have.

Cheers,
Dick Johnson
Penguin : Linux version 2.6.12 on an i686 machine (5537.79 BogoMips).
Warning : 98.36% of all statistics are fiction.
.
I apologize for the following. I tried to kill it with the above dot :

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Thank you.

RE: Wireless support

[alan]

On Mon, 8 Aug 2005, Lee Revell wrote:

> On Mon, 2005-08-08 at 12:56 -0600, Alejandro Bonilla wrote:
> > Again, the point is that ndiswrapper is a great project, but people
> > uses it for the leftovers! We *shouldn't* buy leftovers or from Manuf
> > that don't care about Linux.
> 
> If you are always speccing out new systems then of course, but in the
> real world I have some customers who need to dual boot and ideally it
> would work on their existing hardware.  Linux is a harder sell if people
> need to replace a lot of their gear.

Also remember that some people do not have a choice.  They are stuck with 
the crappy laptops that purchasing gets.

I am in a similar bind.  I was planning on swapping out the minipci 
Broadcom card.  Only after I purchaced the laptop did I find out that the 
bios was set to only recognise that wireless chipset.  (Other than that it 
is an incredible AMD 64 laptop.)

The biggest problem with ndisdriver is that it does not work with 64 bit 
kernels (last I checked) and it does not work with Kismet/AirSnort/etc.

-- 
Q: Why do programmers confuse Halloween and Christmas?
A: Because OCT 31 == DEC 25.

Re: Wireless support

[Adrian Bunk]

On Mon, Aug 08, 2005 at 03:06:58PM -0400, Lee Revell wrote:
> On Mon, 2005-08-08 at 12:56 -0600, Alejandro Bonilla wrote:
> > Again, the point is that ndiswrapper is a great project, but people
> > uses it for the leftovers! We *shouldn't* buy leftovers or from Manuf
> > that don't care about Linux.
> 
> If you are always speccing out new systems then of course, but in the
> real world I have some customers who need to dual boot and ideally it
> would work on their existing hardware.  Linux is a harder sell if people
> need to replace a lot of their gear.

That's the advantage of such drivers.

I see at least two disadvantages:

First, it doesn't encourage hardware manufacturers to support open 
source development.

Linux has only a small market share, but it's slowly growing.

Linux driver support does sometimes influence the decision which 
hardware to buy.

With NdisWrapper, the hardware manufacturer can say:
  "Our hardware is supported through the open source NdisWrapper."

Without NdisWrapper, they will sometimes hear that people did choose to 
buy hardware from a different hardware manufacturer that has a Linux 
driver. This can make the hardware manufacturer more friendly towards 
open source development (e.g. by providing hardware specs).

Secondly, binary-only drivers have an impact on the stability of the 
Linux kernel.

E.g. during the last years the nvidia has produced relatively many 
kernel crashes - and I doubt that binary-only drivers for Windows are 
much better in this respect.

The users only see their kernel crashing blaming the Linux kernel and 
harming the reputation of the stability of Linux.

> Lee

cu
Adrian

-- 

       "Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
        of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
       "Only a promise," Lao Er said.
                                       Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed

Re: Wireless support

[Alejandro Bonilla Beeche]

On Tue, 2005-08-09 at 01:29 +0200, Adrian Bunk wrote:
> On Mon, Aug 08, 2005 at 03:06:58PM -0400, Lee Revell wrote:
> > On Mon, 2005-08-08 at 12:56 -0600, Alejandro Bonilla wrote:
> With NdisWrapper, the hardware manufacturer can say:
>   "Our hardware is supported through the open source NdisWrapper."

 "...I have a dream, were all OEM's will sell their systems and allow
you to choose from your preffered Distro" just like you do when it makes
you choose between XP Home or Professional.

Since I am a Linux user and moved from M$, I have a commandment, which
is, Thou Shalt not buy hardware from people that don't care about Linux.

So far, I'm looking for a video card manufacturer that is *good* and
that has Open Source drivers. But this is another story, and this only
me being too crazy. ;-)

Anyway, ndiswrapper is good, but is a "workaround" for hardware
manufacturers.

.Alejandro

Re: Wireless support

[Jochen Friedrich]

Adrian Bunk wrote:

>I see at least two disadvantages:
>
>First, it doesn't encourage hardware manufacturers to support open 
>source development.
>
>Linux has only a small market share, but it's slowly growing.
>
>Linux driver support does sometimes influence the decision which 
>hardware to buy.
>
>With NdisWrapper, the hardware manufacturer can say:
>  "Our hardware is supported through the open source NdisWrapper."
>
>Without NdisWrapper, they will sometimes hear that people did choose to 
>buy hardware from a different hardware manufacturer that has a Linux 
>driver. This can make the hardware manufacturer more friendly towards 
>open source development (e.g. by providing hardware specs).
>
>Secondly, binary-only drivers have an impact on the stability of the 
>Linux kernel.
>
>E.g. during the last years the nvidia has produced relatively many 
>kernel crashes - and I doubt that binary-only drivers for Windows are 
>much better in this respect.
>
>The users only see their kernel crashing blaming the Linux kernel and 
>harming the reputation of the stability of Linux.
>  
>

Third, both ndiswrapper and binary-only drivers only work on one platform.

E.g. broadcom has a binary-only driver for their WLAN card on Linux, but
only for mipsel (wrt54g).

On Alpha or PowerPC, most WLAN equipment doesn't work under Linux, at all.

Jochen

Re: Wireless support

[Kyle Moffett]

On Aug 9, 2005, at 05:09:55, Jochen Friedrich wrote:
> Third, both ndiswrapper and binary-only drivers only work on one  
> platform.
>
> E.g. broadcom has a binary-only driver for their WLAN card on  
> Linux, but
> only for mipsel (wrt54g).
>
> On Alpha or PowerPC, most WLAN equipment doesn't work under Linux,  
> at all.

Definitely.  I want my Airport Extreme to work!  Many users of the  
BCM4301
chip can get it to work (kinda) with Linux via ndiswrapper, but that  
means
they are much less likely to participate in any kind of reverse  
engineering
effort, even if it's just testing a new driver.

Cheers,
Kyle Moffett

-----BEGIN GEEK CODE BLOCK-----
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W++(+) N+++(++) o? K? w--- O? M++ V? PS+() PE+(-) Y+ PGP+++ t+(+++) 5  
X R?
tv-(--) b++++(++) DI+ D+ G e->++++$ h!*()>++$ r  !y?(-)
------END GEEK CODE BLOCK------

Re: Wireless support

[Rafael J. Wysocki]

On Tuesday, 9 of August 2005 15:52, Kyle Moffett wrote:
> On Aug 9, 2005, at 05:09:55, Jochen Friedrich wrote:
> > Third, both ndiswrapper and binary-only drivers only work on one  
> > platform.
> >
> > E.g. broadcom has a binary-only driver for their WLAN card on  
> > Linux, but
> > only for mipsel (wrt54g).
> >
> > On Alpha or PowerPC, most WLAN equipment doesn't work under Linux,  
> > at all.
> 
> Definitely.  I want my Airport Extreme to work!  Many users of the  
> BCM4301 chip can get it to work (kinda) with Linux via ndiswrapper,
> but that means they are much less likely to participate in any kind of
> reverse engineering effort,

Do you know of anyone actually doing it?

Rafael


-- 
- Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?
- That depends a good deal on where you want to get to.
		-- Lewis Carroll "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland"

Re: Wireless support

[Jochen Friedrich]

Rafael J. Wysocki wrote:

>On Tuesday, 9 of August 2005 15:52, Kyle Moffett wrote:
>  
>
>>On Aug 9, 2005, at 05:09:55, Jochen Friedrich wrote:
>>    
>>
>>>Third, both ndiswrapper and binary-only drivers only work on one  
>>>platform.
>>>
>>>E.g. broadcom has a binary-only driver for their WLAN card on  
>>>Linux, but
>>>only for mipsel (wrt54g).
>>>
>>>On Alpha or PowerPC, most WLAN equipment doesn't work under Linux,  
>>>at all.
>>>      
>>>
>>Definitely.  I want my Airport Extreme to work!  Many users of the  
>>BCM4301 chip can get it to work (kinda) with Linux via ndiswrapper,
>>but that means they are much less likely to participate in any kind of
>>reverse engineering effort,
>>    
>>
>
>Do you know of anyone actually doing it?
>
>Rafael
>
>  
>

See http://linux-bcom4301.sourceforge.net/

Jochen

Re: Wireless support

[Lee Revell]

On Tue, 2005-08-09 at 09:52 -0400, Kyle Moffett wrote:
> they are much less likely to participate in any kind of reverse  
> engineering effort, even if it's just testing a new driver.

I think anyone launching a reverse engineering effort should announce
the project to LKML!  When I set out to add some multichannel
functionality to the emu10k1 ALSA drivers based on the kX project
Windows drivers, I announced the project to alsa-devel and alsa-user,
and got a number of volunteers who were most helpful in testing these
new features, and greatly sped up the effort.  As a result we were able
to fix almost all the major bugs before I even submitted the patch.  Now
these new features are merged as of ALSA 1.0.9.

There is a very large group of people who can't write code but have the
hardware and are dying to get more out of it, or just to get it to work,
and would gladly help any Linux driver reverse engineering project, if
they just knew about it.

Lee

Re: Wireless support

[roucaries bastien]

On 8/12/05, Lee Revell <rlrevell@joe-job.com> wrote:
> On Tue, 2005-08-09 at 09:52 -0400, Kyle Moffett wrote:
> > they are much less likely to participate in any kind of reverse
> > engineering effort, even if it's just testing a new driver.
> 
> I think anyone launching a reverse engineering effort should announce
> the project to LKML!  When I set out to add some multichannel
> functionality to the emu10k1 ALSA drivers based on the kX project
> Windows drivers, I announced the project to alsa-devel and alsa-user,
> and got a number of volunteers who were most helpful in testing these
> new features, and greatly sped up the effort.  As a result we were able
> to fix almost all the major bugs before I even submitted the patch.  Now
> these new features are merged as of ALSA 1.0.9.

Problem:
o They are translating the drivers (about 66% is done, dma and pio are
close to be done) but in order to close claim for broadcom they don't
create divers. This guys will release documentation. See chinese wall
method on wikipedia.
o They post on this list 1 year and a half ago no answer.


> There is a very large group of people who can't write code but have the
> hardware and are dying to get more out of it, or just to get it to work,
> and would gladly help any Linux driver reverse engineering project, if
> they just knew about it.

o They need more programmer for reverse engeenering effort and
different programmer for writing the drivers from the documentation.
Actually 10% take about 3 months. For the courageous people, they
don't reverse directelly from asm but from C. In fact as mips asm is
pretty simple they can translate asm to C.  Nethertheless, it s
spagetty code and variable are referenced by pointer.
Reverse engeenering is therefore:
     - transform goto in for loop or while loop
     - transform *(phy+1054) in : int error or something like this.

o Testing perhaps in the end of year

Moreover this drivers will support all kind of broadcom card as the
drivers look like to be common

> Lee
> 
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> 
bastien

Re: Wireless support

[Lee Revell]

On Fri, 2005-08-12 at 12:59 +1000, roucaries bastien wrote:
> They post on this list 1 year and a half ago no answer.
> 

I guess everyone on LKML has day jobs now, no one has time for fun stuff
like reverse engineering drivers anymore... :-(

Lee

Re: Wireless support

[Kyle Moffett]

On Aug 11, 2005, at 23:17:07, Lee Revell wrote:
> On Fri, 2005-08-12 at 12:59 +1000, roucaries bastien wrote:
>
>> They post on this list 1 year and a half ago no answer.
>
> I guess everyone on LKML has day jobs now, no one has time for fun  
> stuff
> like reverse engineering drivers anymore... :-(

Much as I would love to help, I'm usually buried under schoolwork.   
In any
case, I really have to admire the people behind the project, translating
tens of thousands of MIPS assembly instructions to C, documenting the C,
then giving the documentation to somebody else to write the driver even
though by that point you could write it backwards in a blindfold,  
that has
_got_ to be hard and frustrating work.

Cheers,
Kyle Moffett

--
Somone asked me why I work on this free (http://www.fsf.org/philosophy/)
software stuff and not get a real job. Charles Shultz had the best  
answer:

"Why do musicians compose symphonies and poets write poems? They do  
it because
life wouldn't have any meaning for them if they didn't. That's why I  
draw
cartoons. It's my life."
   -- Charles Shultz