Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S262608AbTKRN23 (ORCPT ); Tue, 18 Nov 2003 08:28:29 -0500 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S262652AbTKRN22 (ORCPT ); Tue, 18 Nov 2003 08:28:28 -0500 Received: from gaia.cela.pl ([213.134.162.11]:30981 "EHLO gaia.cela.pl") by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S262608AbTKRN2V (ORCPT ); Tue, 18 Nov 2003 08:28:21 -0500 Date: Tue, 18 Nov 2003 14:26:41 +0100 (CET) From: Maciej Zenczykowski To: Christian Axelsson cc: Pontus Fuchs , Subject: Re: Announce: ndiswrapper In-Reply-To: <3FBA15B7.7030906@lanil.mine.nu> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Content-Length: 1609 Lines: 35 > Pontus Fuchs wrote: > > Hi, > > > > Since some vendors refuses to release specs or even a binary > > Linux-driver for their WLAN cards I desided to try to solve it myself by > > making a kernel module that can load Ndis (windows network driver API) > > drivers. I'm not trying to implement all of the Ndis API but rather > > implement the functions needed to get these unsupported cards working. > > Sounds like a plan! Definetely agree - question though, are you loading these drivers into ring 0 (kernel space)? As far as I know linux only supports ring 0 (kernel) and 3 (userspace). However this would seem to be the perfect place to load the binary modules in ring 1 (or even userspace if that was possible...). I can't say I trust any binary only and/or windows driver to not make a mess of my kernel :) actually the driver may actually be errorless - it's just designed for a different operating system and thus some unexplainable misshaps could easily happen... While we're at it, loading binary only modules into ring 1 would probably also be a good idea for the NV module et al. Although I have no idea how hard it would be to make ring 1 function (and whether there actually is any point to doing it in ring 1 instead of ring 3 with iopl/ioperm anyway) and how big the performance penalty for non-ring 0 would be... Cheers, MaZe. - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/