Subject: Re: Incorrect signal levels reported using wpa_supplicant's
 driver_nl80211
From: Dan Williams <dcbw@redhat.com>
To: Marcel Holtmann <marcel@holtmann.org>
Cc: Johannes Berg <johannes@sipsolutions.net>,
	Alexander Sack <asac@ubuntu.com>,
	Maxim Levitsky <maximlevitsky@gmail.com>,
	"hostap@lists.shmoo.com" <hostap@lists.shmoo.com>,
	linux-wireless <linux-wireless@vger.kernel.org>,
	networkmanager-list <networkmanager-list@gnome.org>
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Date: Mon, 09 Nov 2009 22:27:48 -0800
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Sender: linux-wireless-owner@vger.kernel.org

On Mon, 2009-11-09 at 14:09 +0100, Marcel Holtmann wrote:
> Hi Johannes,
> 
> > > > Soon.  We've got some patches for this, but we'll also need tons of
> > > > testing.  The WEXT stuff is pretty baked while nl80211 is still under
> > > > some flux.  But of course the only way we bake nl80211 is by switching
> > > > to it...
> > > 
> > > iirc, we currently we hardcode wext in NM code. How about adding a keyfile
> > > config that users could use to switch to nl80211 until we feel confident
> > > that it's good enough for everyone?
> > 
> > commit d27df100b587dd95f3256a8baf9db0c5d4380089 in wpa_supplicant allows
> > you to do that by editing the service file.
> 
> that is funny, when I asked for a global command line switch for
> choosing a different driver, the argument was that the application
> adding the interface is suppose to do it by itself. Now we can do it in
> the service file. Never the less ConnMan got its own switch to choose
> which driver will be used. Does help a lot in testing and is way easier
> since you don't have to restart wpa_supplicant all the time.

In reality, NM upstream will just switch over one day and distros that
use shitty and/or proprietary drivers will need to either (a) fix them,
or (b) patch NM to use wext locally.  That's how progress gets made.

Dan