Return-path: Received: from nbd.name ([46.4.11.11]:44345 "EHLO nbd.name" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1752506Ab2HVU2s (ORCPT ); Wed, 22 Aug 2012 16:28:48 -0400 Message-ID: <503540FC.9030408@openwrt.org> (sfid-20120822_222852_268986_DCB69FD8) Date: Wed, 22 Aug 2012 22:28:44 +0200 From: Felix Fietkau MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Pavel Roskin CC: Sergey Ryazanov , linux-wireless@vger.kernel.org Subject: Re: Per sta interfaces in WDS (4-address) mode References: <20120820111321.71c6f07e@mj> In-Reply-To: <20120820111321.71c6f07e@mj> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Sender: linux-wireless-owner@vger.kernel.org List-ID: On 2012-08-20 5:13 PM, Pavel Roskin wrote: > On Sun, 19 Aug 2012 21:51:27 +0400 > Sergey Ryazanov wrote: > >> Hello dear all, >> >> please tell me, why in the WDS mode, the stack creates a new interface >> for each WDS station, and this interface hostapd adds to the parent AP >> interface bridge? Why we couldn't simply pass this frames via AP >> interface? > > You may want to use a completely different IP address and netmask on the > WDS interface. Using the AP interface would take away that option. > > hostapd is not a part of the kernel. It should be possible not to add > WDS interfaces to the bridge. It's not just that. If the WDS station communication were done over the AP interface, mac80211 would have to keep a table of which MAC address is reachable behind which WDS station, which is something that the bridge layer is supposed to do. I've seen such a design mistake in various drivers, and I've seen the weird quirks that this usually produces in more complex network topologies ;) - Felix