RE: [EXT] Re: [PATCH v9 0/2] wifi: mwifiex: add code to support host mlme

[David Lin]

> From: Johannes Berg <johannes@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> Sent: Tuesday, March 19, 2024 8:13 PM
> To: Brian Norris <briannorris@xxxxxxxxxxxx>; Francesco Dolcini
> <francesco@xxxxxxxxxx>
> Cc: kvalo@xxxxxxxxxx; linux-wireless@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx;
> linux-kernel@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx; David Lin <yu-hao.lin@xxxxxxx>; Pete Hsieh
> <tsung-hsien.hsieh@xxxxxxx>; rafael.beims <rafael.beims@xxxxxxxxxxx>;
> Francesco Dolcini <francesco.dolcini@xxxxxxxxxxx>
> Subject: [EXT] Re: [PATCH v9 0/2] wifi: mwifiex: add code to support host mlme
> 
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> On Fri, 2024-03-15 at 17:49 -0700, Brian Norris wrote:
> >
> > Now that I've looked a bit closer today: I'm realizing this may(?) be
> > one of the first "full MAC" drivers trying to implement its own MLME
> > -- or at least, the auth/assoc bits.
> 
> Hmm, yeah, why _is_ that? mwifiex was originally "sold" as a "full MAC"
> driver, i.e. doing things in the firmware.
> 
> We've said that "soft MAC" drivers should be using mac80211, but this thing
> can't seem to decide?
> 
> Also decl.h should probably _shrink_ rather than grow, a number of things just
> replicate ieee80211.h (such as MWIFIEX_MGMT_HEADER_LEN really is just
> sizeof(ieee80211_mgmt) or so? Not quite correctly.)
> 

This can be done for feature patches.

> So yeah, agree with Brian, not only would this be the first, but it's also
> something we don't really _want_. All other drivers that want stuff like this are
> stuck in staging ...
> 
> So why is this needed for a supposedly "firmware does it all" driver, and why
> can it not be integrated with mac80211 if it's no longer "firmware does it all"?
> 
> Johannes

Our proprietary driver is cfg80211 driver, it is very hard to create a brand new mac80211 driver and still can port all tested stuffs from our proprietary driver.

Thanks,
David