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From:   Kalle Valo <kvalo@kernel.org>
To:     Arend Van Spriel <aspriel@gmail.com>
Cc:     Julian Calaby <julian.calaby@gmail.com>,
        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
Subject: Re: On brcm80211 maintenance and support
References: <6f78e624-62ee-3ae5-1db4-a0411566def8@yandex.ru>
        <CAGRGNgU7aySyUny9aG_+wXiKJ7j1weosa-rZDY4_WAXbq-3ABg@mail.gmail.com>
        <87ttr454bh.fsf@kernel.org>
        <cd9e71c8-2884-427a-a394-756f62ab09ba@gmail.com>
Date:   Wed, 11 Oct 2023 10:46:36 +0300
In-Reply-To: <cd9e71c8-2884-427a-a394-756f62ab09ba@gmail.com> (Arend Van
        Spriel's message of "Mon, 9 Oct 2023 22:22:23 +0200")
Message-ID: <87mswpfvoj.fsf@kernel.org>
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Arend Van Spriel <aspriel@gmail.com> writes:

>>> 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.

Sorry to hear that. I know big corporations well enough that it doesn't
work like that in reality :/

> 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.

I definitely would want you to continue maintaining brcm80211! I know
how difficult it can be between a rock and a hard place so I value your
contributions, and understand sometimes you are not able to react
quickly (or at all).

What about Franky and Hante? I wonder if we should remove them? Or
convert them to reviewers?

Also I'm thinking should we change the driver status to Odd Fixes:

          Odd Fixes:   It has a maintainer but they don't have time to do
                        much other than throw the odd patch in. See below..

Of course there's no practical difference what the driver status is but
I nowadays try to keep the maintainers file up-to-date.

-- 
https://patchwork.kernel.org/project/linux-wireless/list/

https://wireless.wiki.kernel.org/en/developers/documentation/submittingpatches