kernel versionning problem

[Chuck Anderson]

On Mon, Jan 22, 2007 at 05:19:24PM -0600, Jason L Tibbitts III wrote:
> >>>>> "TE" == Tanguy Eric <eric.tanguy at univ-nantes.fr> writes:
> 
> TE> http://rt2x00.serialmonkey.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=2965
> 
> Blah, blah, only breaks on Fedora, blah blah, Fedora people don't know
> how to behave.
> 
> So exactly what is it that Fedora is doing wrong here?

The problem is that the rt2x00 driver assumes that there is an API 
difference between kernels < 2.6.20 and >= 2.6.20.  In truth there is 
no guarantee of a stable API at all in Linux, and that keying off 
LINUX_VERSION_CODE is next to useless.  If you patch the kernel at 
all, what version does it become?  Perhaps one API changed to be like 
Linus' 2.6.20 due to your patch(es), but another API didn't change and 
is still like Linus' 2.6.19.  An out-of-tree driver that keys off 
LINUX_VERSION_CODE can never get this right.  You could change the 
version code to fix one out-of-tree driver, but then that breaks the 
other.