Date: Wed, 23 Oct 2013 11:09:31 -0700 From: Alfred Perlstein <bright@mu.org> To: John Baldwin <jhb@freebsd.org>, freebsd-current@freebsd.org Cc: Adrian Chadd <adrian@freebsd.org>, "Andrey V. Elsukov" <bu7cher@yandex.ru>, "Julian H. Stacey" <jhs@berklix.com>, "freebsd-wireless@freebsd.org" <freebsd-wireless@freebsd.org> Subject: Re: [rfc] removing the NDISulator Message-ID: <526810DB.20705@mu.org> In-Reply-To: <201310231023.32351.jhb@freebsd.org> References: <5265878B.1050809@yandex.ru> <201310212146.r9LLkqZ1044966@fire.js.berklix.net> <CAJ-VmomzydOD-M1oePMuqrgdBCFMTXKCZcGVwu%2BLFTnHTGg0Kw@mail.gmail.com> <201310231023.32351.jhb@freebsd.org>
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On 10/23/13 7:23 AM, John Baldwin wrote: > On Monday, October 21, 2013 6:29:24 pm Adrian Chadd wrote: >> The NDISulator is a crutch from a time when there wasn't _any_ real >> alternative. >> >> There are plenty of alternatives now. What's lacking is desire and >> person-power. But the datasheets are there, or the vendor code has been >> released, or there's linux/otherbsd drivers. >> >> Leaving it in there is just delaying the inevitable - drivers need to be >> fixed, ported, or reverse engineered. >> >> This is going to upset users in the same way that eliminating any other >> transition/sideways compatibility layer upsets users. But as I said, the >> path forward is fixing up the lack of stable drivers, not simply supporting >> some crutch. >> >> If there are drivers that people absolutely need fixed then they should >> stand up and say "hey, I really would like X to work better!" and then >> follow it up with some encouraging incentives. Right now the NDISulator >> lets people work _around_ this by having something that kind of works for >> them but it doesn't improve our general driver / stack ecosystems. > Eh, having taken a stab at porting the bwl blob already, I would strongly > oppose removing NDIS. If you do that I will just stop using my netbook > with a Broadcom part altogether as I wouldn't be able to use it to try to > test bwl changes. The NDIS thing is a bit hackish, but it is quite useful > for a lot of folks. > I have to agree. Deprecation != motivation. -- Alfred Perlstein
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