2.6.22 kernel and WiFi

[Karl Larsen]

Mark Haney wrote:
> Karl Larsen wrote:
>   
>> Mark Haney wrote:
>>     
>>> Karl Larsen wrote:
>>>
>>>  
>>>       
>>>>>         
>>>>>           
>>>> Hi Mark. I am writing a paper about getting WiFi to work on Linux. Are
>>>> you certain there is no Linux software package for your laptop. Do you
>>>> know who made the WiFi hardware in your laptop? Have you been to the web
>>>> page with all the data?
>>>>
>>>> Karl
>>>>
>>>>     
>>>>         
>>> When I last looked (a year ago maybe) it was not supported.  It's a
>>> broadcom card (4306), which, at the time, was supported 32-bit, but not
>>> 64-bit, which is what I have.  That's why I asked about ndiswrapper,
>>> it's the only method I was aware of at the time that would work with
>>> this card and 64-bit.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Ahh, I knew there had to be a catch :-) 
>>>       
>> Your 64 bit system is just too much for the people at Broadcom. They
>> have written software for Linux and it is being used on 32 bit machines
>> with great success.
>>
>>    So you want to use a 64 bit wrapper of the windows .dll file as a way
>> to get going. I will be interested in your results. I hope it works 8-)
>>
>> Karl
>>
>>
>>     
>
> Which is what I do with no problems at all, using ndiswrapper and the
> 64-bit Windows NDIS driver.  It's worked great for 2 years now.
> Howevre, with the rewrite to the wireless stack I was concerned that
> upgrading to that kernel would either break ndiswrapper altogether or
> would still be usable until a new driver was considered stable.
>
>
>
>   
    I show my ignorance here but I sure thought you treat the 
ndiswrapper file as a module for the kernel and you have to install it 
into a new kernel. I know Fedora sends RPM packed kernel modifications 
and I have no idea how those work!

    In my kernel work days we had to compile the kernel AND the modules. 
I think you still have to but it is done at Red Hat and they send all 
the stuff as binary files in the RPM. To you it means the ndiswrapper 
was compiled into a kernel. If you change to another kernel you will 
need to do it again.

Karl