[Debian-eeepc-devel] Bug#497200: ITP: rt2860-source -- source for RT2860 wireless adapter kernel module

Damyan Ivanov dam at modsoftsys.com
Mon Sep 1 07:07:10 UTC 2008


-=| Ben Hutchings, Sat, Aug 30, 2008 at 11:16:27PM +0100 |=-
> On Sat, 2008-08-30 at 22:08 +0300, Damyan Ivanov wrote:
> > Package: wnpp
> > Severity: wishlist
> > Owner: Damyan Ivanov <dmn at debian.org>
> > 
> > * Package name    : rt2860-source
> >   Version         : 1.7.0.0
> >   Upstream Author : Ralink Tech Inc
> > * URL             : http://www.ralinktech.com/
> > * License         : GPL-2+  some binary non-free firmware
> >   Programming Lang: C
> >   Description     : source for RT2860 wireless adapter kernel module
> > 
> > RT2860 is a wireless adapter found particularly in the ASUS EeePC model
> > 901 and above. The package contains the source of a Linux kernel module
> > for it.
> 
> Would you like to include this in the pkg-ralink project on Alioth?

It is currently under debian-eeepc Git[1], but I find what you say 
very attractive, especially if it is extended a bit:

    [1] http://git.debian.org/?p=debian-eeepc/rt2860.git;a=summary

Would you like to take over the package? I'd gladly put it in the 
hands of people having experience dealing with ralink-based cards.

What do the rest of Debian EeePC Team thinks?

The package is as ready for 2.6.26 as I can get it without digging 
deep about moving the firmware into a separate package.

> > There may be some licensing problems and this is why I CC 
> > debian-legal.
> > All the sources are licensed under GPL-2+, except one file,
> > include/firmware.h, which is generated from a binary blob and contains
> > the following notice:
> <snip>
> > I did not yet check if this code is actually linked in the GPL-2+
> > module, but have a bad feeling it it does. Would a compiled GPL source,
> > including firmware.h be even distributable?
> 
> Possibly not.  The module source code should go in contrib with the blob
> and firmware.h removed.  The blob should go in the firmware-ralink
> binary package built from the firmware-nonfree source package.

Or, the madwifi way - put only -source package in non-free and let 
users build the module with module-assistant.

> > Perhaps the module can be changed to load its firmware from 
> > external
> > file or even not need that nasty firmware.h (there are traces of
> > support to other hardware and that firmware may be for them).
> 
> This should not be too hard.  Look at rt73 for an example of how
> this has been done in an existing Ralink driver.

Moving the firmware away would also make it possible for a -modules 
package to be made part of linux-modules-extra, right? That would be a 
good thing.

-- 
dam            JabberID: dam at jabber.minus273.org
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