From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: "John W. Linville" Subject: Re: rtl8180 driver in master/ad-hoc mode Date: Fri, 12 Feb 2010 10:08:53 -0500 Message-ID: <20100212150853.GA4983@tuxdriver.com> References: <4B756B4C.2090204@gmail.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Cc: netdev@vger.kernel.org To: Radu Potop Return-path: Received: from charlotte.tuxdriver.com ([70.61.120.58]:35611 "EHLO smtp.tuxdriver.com" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1756405Ab0BLPPv (ORCPT ); Fri, 12 Feb 2010 10:15:51 -0500 Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <4B756B4C.2090204@gmail.com> Sender: netdev-owner@vger.kernel.org List-ID: On Fri, Feb 12, 2010 at 04:53:00PM +0200, Radu Potop wrote: > I noticed that the rtl8180 (Realtek wireless PCI adapter) driver for > Linux doesn't support master or ad-hoc mode. However the rtl-wifi driver > from http://rtl-wifi.sourceforge.net does support these modes. > After a bit of investigation, I found out that the driver from the > kernel is not maintained by its original author anymore (no changes since > 2007), while rtl-wifi development is active. A bit too little investigation, it seems. The rtl8180 driver doesn't get lots of attention, but it has been hit several times since 2007. As for master and ad-hoc modes, I've recently taken interest there and expect to be adding patches shortly. > My question is if rtl-wifi will make it into the kernel? rtl-wifi is > actually a fork of the old driver, but with a lot of added functionality. > I'm sure that a lot of folks would like to use their hardware to its full > potential. No it will not. For one, svn indicates rtl-wifi is nowhere near as active as you indicate: /home/linville/svn/rtl-wifi [linville-t400.local]:> svn log ------------------------------------------------------------------------ r83 | falmouth | 2008-07-09 08:52:33 -0400 (Wed, 09 Jul 2008) | 1 line our CCMP, TKIP and WEP modules names end in -rtl Beyond that, no one from there is posting any patches and in any case it is rather rare to simply drop one more-or-less working driver in favor of another one simply because it appears from nowhere. Anyway, as I indicated I have been taking more interest in rtl8180 lately and I expect it to be greatly improved at least in time for 2.6.35 (since the 2.6.34 development cycle will be ending soon). Hth! John -- John W. Linville Someday the world will need a hero, and you linville@tuxdriver.com might be all we have. Be ready.