wireless-2.6 queue opened

wireless-2.6 queue opened

[Jeff Garzik]

It's high time that Linux get a serious effort going on a generic 802.11 
stack, as it seems we are in danger of having every new wireless driver 
invent one if we do not.

Given that there are at least 3 complete wireless stacks (or 
thereabouts) floating about for Linux, I picked one that I felt had the 
best chance of being _evolved_ into a nice, clean, generic wireless 
stack:  HostAP.

My general hope (plan?) is that generic wireless code can be arrived at 
without horribly intrusive changes that require a 2.7 kernel. 
wireless-2.6 is targetted for eventual merging, but it won't be 
submitted anytime soon.

Now it's time for open source to kick into action :)  wireless-2.6 queue 
is available in patch form or BitKeeper for review.  Or, if you object 
to my selection of wireless code, now's the time to speak up.

BTW to Intel Centrino folks -- I would like to merge the current (open 
source) Centrino driver into wireless-2.6 as well, to get it more 
exposure, and also to ensure that it uses whatever generic 802.11 code 
happens to appear...

Oh, and please speak up on netdev@oss.sgi.com, or at least CC there.

Patch:
http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/people/jgarzik/patchkits/2.6/2.6.7-rc2-bk3-wireless1.patch.bz2

BitKeeper (all of these are equivalent):
bk://kernel.bkbits.net/jgarzik/wireless-2.6
bk://gkernel.bkbits.net/wireless-2.6
http://gkernel.bkbits.net/wireless-2.6 (note: _not_ a Web URL)




Finally, here is Jouni's patch submission message, elaborating on the 
driver-specific details:
> Finally, here's the first attempt at submitting Host AP code for
> wireless-2.6 tree. In addition, this could be considered for merging
> into linus-2.5 tree, so review and comments are very much welcome. Host
> AP code has lived in an external CVS repository for three years and is
> widely used.
> 
> The included patch has minimal changes to the current tree (against
> 2.6.6, but should apply to different versions with some differences in
> line numbers) for including a new directory drivers/net/wireless/hostap.
> The contents of that new directory is a bit large for a patch file and
> since all the files are new, I made it available as a compressed tarball
> at http://hostap.epitest.fi/hostap-linux.tgz. This should be untarred in
> the root of the kernel tree (i.e., the file paths in the tarball start
> with drivers/net/wirelss/hostap/...).
> 
> I removed most of the backwards (for Linux 2.4, pcmcia-cs modules,
> different wireless extensions versions) compatibility code. In addition,
> I replaced integrated implementations of ARC4, Michael MIC, and AES with
> crypto API. AES-CCM mode is still implemented in hostap_crypt_ccmp.c,
> but it could be moved at some point to crypto API as a new encryption
> mode.

Re: wireless-2.6 queue opened

[David S. Miller]

On Wed, 02 Jun 2004 23:45:28 -0400
Jeff Garzik <jgarzik@pobox.com> wrote:

> Given that there are at least 3 complete wireless stacks (or 
> thereabouts) floating about for Linux, I picked one that I felt had the 
> best chance of being _evolved_ into a nice, clean, generic wireless 
> stack:  HostAP.

Even though I authored one of the "other" stacks, I'm totally fine
with this choice.  Mainly because I simply lack the time or resources
to continue working on the stack I started.

Re: wireless-2.6 queue opened

[Jeff Garzik]

David S. Miller wrote:
> On Wed, 02 Jun 2004 23:45:28 -0400
> Jeff Garzik <jgarzik@pobox.com> wrote:
> 
> 
>>Given that there are at least 3 complete wireless stacks (or 
>>thereabouts) floating about for Linux, I picked one that I felt had the 
>>best chance of being _evolved_ into a nice, clean, generic wireless 
>>stack:  HostAP.
> 
> 
> Even though I authored one of the "other" stacks, I'm totally fine
> with this choice.  Mainly because I simply lack the time or resources
> to continue working on the stack I started.


Actually...   I want to use some of your stuff too.  :)  HostAP is a 
successful implementation, but your stuff was a good example of the glue 
needed to tie 802.11 tightly to the net stack.

HostAP still has some "its a separate driver" stuff it needs to get rid 
of, as it is made more generic.

	Jeff

Re: wireless-2.6 queue opened

[James Ketrenos]

I thought I had replied to this, but I don't see it in my sent, drafts, 
or on the list... so, I'll recompose and send again.

Jeff Garzik wrote:

> It's high time that Linux get a serious effort going on a generic 
> 802.11 stack, as it seems we are in danger of having every new 
> wireless driver invent one if we do not.

Agreed.

> Given that there are at least 3 complete wireless stacks (or 
> thereabouts) floating about for Linux, I picked one that I felt had 
> the best chance of being _evolved_ into a nice, clean, generic 
> wireless stack:  HostAP.

This is the path that ipw2100 has been following; we have taken a 
snapshot of the Host AP code and have generalized the Tx/Rx stacks to 
remove all HW specific fields and structures so we can use them for the 
ipw2100 and (eventually) the ipw2200 project. 

We currently have a HW independent stack that should work for any 
underlying card that can Tx/Rx 802.11 data frames.  This stack is based 
on Host AP 0.1.3 (Pedro Ramalhais has since written a patch for ipw2100 
that will update it to using the Host AP CVS)

The stack we have is not as complete as the original Host AP project -- 
portions of the code (specifically those aspects which I can't test or 
leverage w/ the HW I have) have been wrapped in #ifdef/#endif blocks 
(pretty much everything dealing with master mode).

As we've been trying to track down some ipw2100 project defects we've 
been liberal in throwing some ipw2100 specific checks into the 
ieee80211_* files, but those are easily removed.  Also a result of that 
defect tracking there is some code in those files that just needs to be 
cleaned up/removed.

> My general hope (plan?) is that generic wireless code can be arrived 
> at without horribly intrusive changes that require a 2.7 kernel. 
> wireless-2.6 is targetted for eventual merging, but it won't be 
> submitted anytime soon.

Performance optimizations for wireless may be a bit more intrusive, but 
are not required (AFAIK) to get a generic stack with performance and 
features equivelant to what is currently enabled by the various drivers 
available.

<snip>

> BTW to Intel Centrino folks -- I would like to merge the current (open 
> source) Centrino driver into wireless-2.6 as well, to get it more 
> exposure, and also to ensure that it uses whatever generic 802.11 code 
> happens to appear...

I would like to get a couple stability issues resolved before we 
incorporate the ipw2100 driver into the wireless-2.6 set.

For those that are curious, the current work plan for the ipw2100 is 
(roughly):

0) Fix fragmentation in the current ieee80211_* Tx/Rx stack
1) Generalize the management frame handling (as much as is currently 
required) into ieee80211_*
2) Extract the ieee80211_* code so that it can be compiled into the 
kernel separate from ipw2100 (either as a module or static)
3) Create a patchset for the wireless extension interface to support 
what's needed to configure algos and keys (based in part on what is done 
in Host AP and other drivers).  Also provide a patchset for the user 
space tools.  Hopefully that will kick off lots of discussion :)

During all of the above we will also be working to fix existing 
stability and feature issues.  Main issues here deal with a data 
corruption issue during C3 processor transitions as well as random 
stalling of SSL connections.

James

Re: wireless-2.6 queue opened

[Colin LEROY]

Hi,

Just a quick question about the generic 802.11 stack. Is USB support planned for
this?

I'm asking, because I read on the web that adding USB support to hostap would be
a lot of work:
http://sisyphus.iocaine.com/pipermail/hostap/2004-March/006076.html

-- 
Colin
  This message represents the official view of the voices
  in my head.