From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: Jeff Garzik Subject: Re: Broadcom 43xx first results Date: Mon, 05 Dec 2005 14:08:28 -0500 Message-ID: <4394902C.8060100@pobox.com> References: <20051205190038.04b7b7c1@griffin.suse.cz> <4394892D.2090100@gentoo.org> <20051205195543.5a2e2a8d@griffin.suse.cz> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Cc: Joseph Jezak , mbuesch@freenet.de, linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org, bcm43xx-dev@lists.berlios.de, NetDev Return-path: To: Jiri Benc In-Reply-To: <20051205195543.5a2e2a8d@griffin.suse.cz> Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org List-Id: netdev.vger.kernel.org Jiri Benc wrote: > On Mon, 05 Dec 2005 13:38:37 -0500, Joseph Jezak wrote: > >>We're not writing an entire stack. We're writing a layer that sits in >>between the current ieee80211 stack that's already present in the kernel >>and drivers that do not have a hardware MAC. Since ieee80211 is already >>in use in the kernel today, this seemed like a natural and useful >>extension to the existing code. I agree that it's somewhat wasteful to >>keep rewriting 802.11 stacks and we considered other options, but it >>seemed like a more logical choice to work with what was available and >>recommended than to use an external stack. > > > Unfortunately, the only long-term solution is to rewrite completely the > current in-kernel ieee80211 code (I would not call it a "stack") or > replace it with something another. The current code was written for > Intel devices and it doesn't support anything else - so every developer Patently false. ieee80211 is used by Intel. Some bits used by HostAP, which also duplicates a lot of ieee80211 code. And bcm43xx. And another couple drivers found in -mm or out-of-tree. > of a wifi driver tries to implement his own "softmac" now. I cannot see > how this can move as forward and I think we can agree this is not the > way to go. You're agreeing with only yourself, then? > Rewriting (or, if you like, enhancing) the current 802.11 code seems to > be wasting of time now, when nearly complete Linux stack was opensourced > by Devicescape. We can try to merge it, but I'm not convinced it is > possible, the Devicescape's stack is far more advanced. This invalid logic is why we have a ton of wireless stacks, all duplicating each other. Jeff