Openmoko Bug #2277: Wireless does not work with the 2.6.29 kernel

[Openmoko Public Trac]

#2277: Wireless does not work with the 2.6.29 kernel
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 Reporter:  arhuaco  |          Owner:  openmoko-devel      
     Type:  defect   |         Status:  new                 
 Priority:  normal   |      Milestone:  stable-kernel-2009.1
Component:  unknown  |        Version:                      
 Severity:  normal   |       Keywords:                      
 Haspatch:  0        |      Blockedby:                      
Estimated:           |    Patchreview:                      
 Blocking:           |   Reproducible:  sometimes           
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Comment(by budfive):

 I figured out the bigger problem. Short version:

 ifconfig eth0 down
 ifconfig eth0 up

 makes the driver unusable. Many programs that automatically set up the
 network do this, and end up hosing the driver.

 Long version:
 In the current driver, there are several variables that define the
 "readiness" of the driver. One of these is ar->arWmiReady. If this
 variable is FALSE, no wireless calls succeed (iwconfig, iwlist, etc).
 Currently, this variable is set to true only from ar6000_rx, NOT from
 ar6000_open.

 When ar6000_init is called (during the module load or the kernel boot if
 ar6k is compiled-in), ar6000_rx ends up being called (not quite sure why)
 and this allows the driver to work. ar6000_close (ifconfig eth0 down) sets
 ar->arWmiReady to FALSE. However, a successive "ifconfig eth0 up" does NOT
 reset the ar->arWmiReady variable, and the driver stays in an unusable
 state. Reloading the kernel module allows the driver to work again.

 ar6000_open needs to set up the variables to allow the driver to work. Is
 the author of the driver still around?

-- 
Ticket URL: <https://docs.openmoko.org/trac/ticket/2277#comment:14>
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