Subject: Re: RFC: Starting a stable kernel series off the 2.6 kernel
From: Arjan van de Ven <arjan@infradead.org>
To: Matthias Andree <matthias.andree@gmx.de>
Cc: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org
In-Reply-To: <20051204132813.GA4769@merlin.emma.line.org>
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Date: Sun, 04 Dec 2005 14:35:38 +0100
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On Sun, 2005-12-04 at 14:28 +0100, Matthias Andree wrote:

> I meant the ipmi, smbus and copa modules by Fujitsu-Siemens.
> 
> They are provided in source form, but I just found out (reading the
> headers and not just the lines that broke the compile) they are not open
> source. Perhaps one should prod them to slap a modified-BSD or perhaps
> GPL label onto their modules.

is there an URL to these?

> 
> It seems you'd then maintain them after their submission? :-)

usually such modules are extremely low maintenance once merged.... There
are many many drivers without a maintainer, and they still get fixed.


> > It's rare even in the 2.6 tree to mass-break well written drivers. Just
> > because it's a lot of work to fix all in kernel drivers up. But a fully
> > stable API is also not good. My guess is that the drivers that break
> > most are the ones using the not-right APIs (eg internals and such). 
> 
> These use inter_module_get() 

which is still there even in the latest 2.6.15-rc. It should be going
out but hasn't yet. And that is the case for at least a year (eg they
are __deprecated but still there).

>  and some #include headers that have moved around between
> linux and asm directories.

Most of those were already in the final place with a temporary compat
header in the old one I guess. But if this is all.... that really isn't
a big deal. I suspect some of these headers aren't even used by the
driver (sometimes people just include the world for no reason)..


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