From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-path: Received: from c60.cesmail.net ([216.154.195.49]:35193 "EHLO c60.cesmail.net" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1753157AbZI1Wdf (ORCPT ); Mon, 28 Sep 2009 18:33:35 -0400 Subject: Re: Firmware versioning best practices From: Pavel Roskin To: "Luis R. Rodriguez" Cc: linux-wireless , reinette chatre , Kalle Valo , Johannes Berg , Christian Lamparter , Bob Copeland In-Reply-To: <43e72e890909281517k23abaf8dvd3e84837ce307429@mail.gmail.com> References: <43e72e890909281517k23abaf8dvd3e84837ce307429@mail.gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain Date: Mon, 28 Sep 2009 18:33:31 -0400 Message-Id: <1254177211.21847.15.camel@mj> Mime-Version: 1.0 Sender: linux-wireless-owner@vger.kernel.org List-ID: On Mon, 2009-09-28 at 15:17 -0700, Luis R. Rodriguez wrote: > The ath_hif_usb driver will require the ar9271 firmware file but in > the future an open firmware might become available. The ar9170 driver > already is under the same situation already: a closed firmware is > available but an open firmware can be used, only thing is ar9170 uses > the same firmware name for both. We *could* change ar9170 to use the > Intel practice of tagging a version at the end of each firmware > release, like ar9170-1.fw but ar9170 originally was implemented with a > 2-stage firmware requirement and so ar9170-1.fw is already taken. Versions don't have to start with 1. We could start e.g. with 10. > ar9170 still needs a solution for the different firmwares, once we > start supporting the open firmware through some sort of release but > I'd like to address ath_hif_usb now early so that we don't run into > these snags and use some decent convention that is easy to follow. We could use ar9170-apiversion-codeverestion.fw and link it to ar9170-apiversion.fw. That is, if the open firmware version is 0.9.0 and it was compiled for API version 12, the filename would be ar9170-12-0.9.0.fw and it could be linked to ar9170-12.fw. > As I noted above, Intel seems to use the device-1.fw, device-2.fw > naming convention. Is this the best approach? Or shall we have the > same firmware filename and simply query the firmware for a map of > capabilities? Any other ideas? Distinctive names are good for simplicity of administration and the capabilities are good for the sanity of the driver. But I don't see why we cannot have both. -- Regards, Pavel Roskin