Received-SPF: pass (google.com: domain of linux-wireless-owner@vger.kernel.org designates 23.128.96.36 as permitted sender) client-ip=23.128.96.36;
Message-ID: <cd9e71c8-2884-427a-a394-756f62ab09ba@gmail.com>
Date:   Mon, 9 Oct 2023 22:22:23 +0200
MIME-Version: 1.0
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:102.0) Gecko/20100101
 Thunderbird/102.15.1
Subject: Re: On brcm80211 maintenance and support
Content-Language: en-US
To:     Kalle Valo <kvalo@kernel.org>,
        Julian Calaby <julian.calaby@gmail.com>
Cc:     Dmitry Antipov <dmantipov@yandex.ru>,
        "linux-wireless@vger.kernel.org" <linux-wireless@vger.kernel.org>,
        "lvc-project@linuxtesting.org" <lvc-project@linuxtesting.org>,
        Franky Lin <franky.lin@broadcom.com>,
        Hante Meuleman <hante.meuleman@broadcom.com>,
        Hector Martin <marcan@marcan.st>,
        SHA-cyfmac-dev-list@infineon.com,
        brcm80211-dev-list.pdl@broadcom.com
References: <6f78e624-62ee-3ae5-1db4-a0411566def8@yandex.ru>
 <CAGRGNgU7aySyUny9aG_+wXiKJ7j1weosa-rZDY4_WAXbq-3ABg@mail.gmail.com>
 <87ttr454bh.fsf@kernel.org>
From:   Arend Van Spriel <aspriel@gmail.com>
In-Reply-To: <87ttr454bh.fsf@kernel.org>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
Precedence: bulk

On 10/6/2023 2:21 PM, Kalle Valo wrote:
> Julian Calaby <julian.calaby@gmail.com> writes:
> 
>> Hi Dmitry,
>>
>> (relevant people and lists CC'd)
>>
>> On Fri, Oct 6, 2023 at 3:16 AM Dmitry Antipov <dmantipov@yandex.ru> wrote:
>>>
>>> Kalle,
>>>
>>> what's an actual status of brcm80211 driver? It seems
>>> that the relevant MAINTAINERS entries are no longer
>>> useful, and [1] states that Broadcom is just "disappeared".
>>
>> Arend hasn't posted since February:
>> https://lore.kernel.org/linux-wireless/63f72045-e51d-d9a4-a0ed-c221bcdcee03@gmail.com/
>>
>> Franky is still reviewing things as of early August:
>> https://lore.kernel.org/linux-wireless/CA+8PC_evb-6Y3dKnAN4BN=ODEVxY5-cDb6Lc72u0j1WBtx7p1A@mail.gmail.com/
>>
>> Hante hasn't posted since 2018:
>> https://lore.kernel.org/linux-wireless/4f6223b8083ed69432493a37d4f45b69@mail.gmail.com/
>>
>> Hector Martin has a bunch of Apple-specific patches downstream in the
>> Asahi Linux kernel and has been looking for guidance on how to
>> upstream it without any real answers:
>> https://lore.kernel.org/linux-wireless/181af6e9-799d-b730-dc14-ee2de2541f35@marcan.st/
>>
>> There's also speculation that the Raspberry Pi people have downstream
>> patches too, but I haven't been able to find anything concrete in a
>> very brief search.
> 
> Thanks for the research, that is helpful.
> 
>> Finally, the Cypress / Infineon people appear to be uninterested in
>> discussing the driver.
>>
>> I think it's pretty safe to say that this driver is nearly
>> unmaintained by Broadcom, definitely unmaintained by Cypress /
>> Infineon and Arend is unable to answer questions relating to anything
>> beyond the code as-written.
>>
>> Kalle, should this driver get orphaned?
> 
> We definitely need to consider that but let's first wait for Arend to
> comment.

Using my personal email account to comment. Broadcom has pulled away 
most resources from the brcm80211 drivers as there is no business 
interest for it and it turned into a one-fifth man show as I was granted 
to work one day a week on brcm80211. Nice theory but in practice other 
work always takes priority. So "nearly unmaintained" is no exaggeration. 
I probably can not meet the expectations some people in the community 
have regarding driver maintainers, but I can still review patch 
submissions although I should keep a better eye on the list to do that. 
It would not be my choice to abandon brcm80211, but if my contributions 
are considered insufficient than I will accept that fact.

Ever since Infineon took over Cypress wifi business things turned quiet 
soon. Their website still claims brcmfmac is the driver to use. Earlier 
this year I did have contact with them to hear whether they were 
committed to the driver. At least I got an answer, but not much more 
than that.

Regards,
Arend