OT: Re: kernel versionning problem
Thomas M Steenholdt
tmus at tmus.dk
Tue Jan 23 07:59:28 UTC 2007
Josh Boyer wrote:
> On Mon, Jan 22, 2007 at 07:12:29PM -0500, Chuck Anderson wrote:
>> 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.
>
> Exactly. This is something external driver maintainers just have to deal
> with if their driver isn't upstream¹.
>
> josh
>
> ¹ Have is said the word "upstream" enough in this thread? No? Repeat after
> me... "Upstream, Upstream, it's our way. Upstream, Upstream anything else
> will ruin your day."²
>
> ² I apologize for my crappy cheer.
>
Not crappy, but spot on ;-D
/Thomas
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