Re: [PATCH 00/10] staging: wfx: introduce nl80211 vendor extensions

From: Kalle Valo
Date: Wed May 27 2020 - 08:34:52 EST


Jerome Pouiller <Jerome.Pouiller@xxxxxxxxxx> writes:

> This series introduces some nl80211 vendor extensions to the wfx driver.
>
> This series may lead to some discussions:
>
> 1. Patch 7 allows to change the dynamic PS timeout. I have found
> an API in wext (cfg80211_wext_siwpower()) that do more or less the
> same thing. However, I have not found any equivalent in nl80211. Is it
> expected or this API should be ported to nl80211?

struct wireless_dev::ps_timeout doesn't work for you?

>
> 2. The device The device allows to do Packet Traffic Arbitration (PTA or
> also Coex). This feature allows the device to communicate with another
> RF device in order to share the access to the RF. The patch 9 provides
> a way to configure that. However, I think that this chip is not the
> only one to provide this feature. Maybe a standard way to change
> these parameters should be provided?
>
> 3. For these vendor extensions, I have used the new policy introduced by
> the commit 901bb989185516 ("nl80211: require and validate vendor
> command policy"). However, it seems that my version of 'iw' is not
> able to follow this new policy (it does not pack the netlink
> attributes into a NLA_NESTED). I could develop a tool specifically for
> that API, but it is not very handy. So, in patch 10, I have also
> introduced an API for compatibility with iw. Any comments about this?

If you want the driver out of staging I recommend not adding any vendor
commands until the driver is moved to drivers/net/wireless. Also do note
that we have special rules for nl80211 vendor commands:

https://wireless.wiki.kernel.org/en/developers/documentation/nl80211#vendor-specific_api

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