February 2006 - openSUSE Factory - openSUSE Mailing Lists

SUSE Linux 10.1 Beta4 is delayed...
by Andreas Jaeger 17 Feb '06

17 Feb '06

FYI: We have found some showstoppers and need some more time to fix them, so Beta4 is at least a day late... Andreas -- Andreas Jaeger, aj(a)suse.de, http://www.suse.de/~aj/ SUSE LINUX Products GmbH, Maxfeldstr. 5, 90409 Nürnberg, Germany GPG fingerprint = 93A3 365E CE47 B889 DF7F FED1 389A 563C C272 A126

8 17

Re[2]: 2.6.16 serious consequences / GPL_EXPORT_SYMBOL / USB drivers of major vendor excluded
by s.schmidt＠avm.de 16 Feb '06

16 Feb '06

We are pleased to note that the GPL_EXPORT_SYMBOL fix has been withdrawn. This is particularly important for customers who have been relying on good driver coverage for ISDN/DSL devices with SUSE distributions over the past few years. However, as we understand the ongoing discussion, a number of people are tending towards a position of enforcement of USB GPL drivers only. We would like to take this opportunity to clarify where we see the differences between AVM and other devices and the difficulties regarding a possible move towards user mode. The user space does not ensure the reliability of time critical analog services like Fax G3 or analog modem emulations. This quality of service can only be guaranteed within the kernel space. Let me explain that issue using the FaxG3-service as an example. Fax G3 (T.30) is not specified as a data protocol with error-free transmission. Let us assume, there is a system peak demand on the host system, while a fax is incoming, e.g. because of a parallel access of a higher prioritized process. Handled in user mode, the user gets broken or fragmented faxes as a result. Same for the communication with analogue remote stations (modems) over a digital net (ISDN). You cannot speak about reliable quality of service anymore. Only the kernel offers low latency and timeline processing which is required for soft DSP alike processing. This should be OS independent and from our point of view, Linux should not be inferior to any other OS. Of course, other OS also have the concept of shifting usb drivers to user space, but time critical demands are explicitly excluded. The given examples gPhoto und rio500 at http://libusb.sourceforge.net/doc/examples-other.html operate mostly unidirectionally. Isochronical services within the libusb, especially the USB driver framework for the user mode are not ready for bidirectional operation. Even though the current libusb development started integrating the isochronous transfer support, it still is under construction and it is unclear if this task can be accomplished at all (see statement from Johannes Erdfelt at http://sourceforge.net/mailarchive/forum.php?thread_id=9531397&forum_id=5425 ). In contrast, AVM's driver concept is established for many years now. So the user mode does not seem to be an alternative for ISDN/DSL communication devices at the moment. Moreover, a rework of more than 30 devices would consume a lot of development resources. You will hardly find a similiar company situation. We are not talking about a 10 to 20kByte mouse driver, but rather >600kByte of complex work per device. Take a look at the FRITZ!Card PCI package atftp://ftp.avm.de/cardware/fritzcrd.pci/linux/suse.93/fcpci-suse93-3.11-07.tar.gz). As a private corporation our primary focus is market relevance. AVM invested more than 10 years of work to make analog services like Fax G3 and analog modem emulation available to users of the digital ISDN network. The situation is similar for the DSL part of the driver with very complex DSP algorithms. To anticipate any "open vs. closed source" discussion:Only a handful of companies worldwide have such know-how. With regard to our competitive situation, we have to protect our hard-won intellectual property and therefore cannot open the closed source part of the driver. Kind Regards Sven Schmidt AVM Audiovisuelles Marketing und Computersysteme GmbH Alt-Moabit 95, 10559 Berlin, Germany http://www.avm.de Greg KH <greg(a)kroah.com> An 05.02.2006 21:53 s.schmidt(a)avm.de Kopie linux-kernel(a)vger.kernel.org, opensuse-factory(a)opensuse.org, kkeil(a)suse.de Thema Re: 2.6.16 serious consequences / GPL_EXPORT_SYMBOL / USB drivers of major vendor excluded On Fri, Feb 03, 2006 at 05:24:10PM +0100, s.schmidt(a)avm.de wrote: > on January 15th / major change in USB subsystem and GPL_EXPORT_SYMBOL > declaration > Greg Kroah-Hartman added a Patch to kernel 2.6.15-git12, which > substantially changed the USB system. Have you asked Greg why he did this? Have you asked what the other alternatives are? You do know about usbfs/libusb that allows you to write USB drivers in userspace that can go at the full speed of the USB bus? Why not redo your code to take advantage of this? If you do that, the extra bonus is that your drivers will also work on the BSDs and possibly Windows with no changes needed (I think libusb works on Windows...) > This mail is not intended to provoke a discussion of open vs closed source. > The only intention of this mail is to make you aware of the consequences of > such a decision. I was not aware of your drivers, but now that you have informed me of them, I am willing to work with you to figure out how to resolve this issue. thanks, greg k-h

3 2

ivtv driver for Hauppauge PVR TV-cards missing in 10.1b3
by Markus Koßmann 16 Feb '06

16 Feb '06

Just noticed, that there is no ivtv driver coming with 10.1b3. Will this be changed in the final release ?

1 0

translate xine
by Günther J. Niederwimmer 15 Feb '06

15 Feb '06

Hello, I wanted to translate xine again, there am however a dependence on mad. One needs this file or is it a relict ? I can't find the packet mad ? -- mit freundlichen Grüßen / best Regards, Günther J. Niederwimmer

4 6

Re: AVM/SUSE/Novell long-term relationship endangered
by L T Pensch 14 Feb '06

14 Feb '06

Carl-Daniel wrote: > Of the proprietary drivers, all USB drivers could be migrated > to userspace with libusb as Greg Kroah-Hartman suggested. This > would allow to keep them proprietary yet keep them out of the > kernel. Problem solved for them. Are you sure? Greg does not know these devices and their drivers, his statement may be based on some stable knowledge of successful transition projects from kernel to user space *for some other de- vices* but simply taking this as a base to judge upon these ISDN and DSL device is not reasonable. Do you know for sure that libusb performance meets the strict requirements imposed by some of the protocols involved? As far as I understand this game, you will run into problems when trying to implement the required timing and reduce lethal latencies *in user space* for these drivers. How many context/task transactions are acceptible for such a monster while doing 6MB/s DSL from kernel to userspace back to kernel and so forth? Let's face it... Go to eBay, sell your device to some Windows guys, if ever, it will take a long time before you can use your hardware on Linux again. :-( Regards, Lysander Pensch

2 1

ZENWorks Software Installer
by Marcel Hilzinger 14 Feb '06

14 Feb '06

Hi, is it supposed to work in Beta3? If yes, where can I find a small howto? Marcel

4 4

10.1 Beta 3 - Quanta monitor drivers missing
by David Wright 13 Feb '06

13 Feb '06

I just tried to install Beta 3 on my laptop (Acer Extensa 4100, also known as Travelmate I believe). It requires the Quanta driver for the display (1280x800 LCD), the default LCD values for a 1280x800@60/75Hz don't work - I just get a black screen. I'm currently working through other general settings under Vesa and LCD, but until now I haven't found a single monitor setting which will display anything... Can we please have the Quanta settings back? Dave

2 3

10.1 upgrade alert - wallpapers
by Martin Schulz 13 Feb '06

13 Feb '06

just wanted to pass on my opinion about the move to take the wallpapers out of the /opt/kde3/share tree and put them into /usr/share. While overall not a bad idea to consolidate the wallpapers, it breaks the user's background config without warning. What's wrong with a simple symbolic link to fix that? Similarly, I had the SuSE93 kdm theme configured, which has disappeared. What's wrong with a package to wrap the backwards compatible bootsplash, kdm themes and defunct wallpapers, and make it such that the user need not break his thumb to get them configured as they were. I understand the idea of 'branding' etc., but personally it annoys me quite a bit. By the way, this is not meant to put down the newest theme, keep up the good work. Thanks! Martin

4 3

KDE_USE_IPV6="yes"
by Marcel Hilzinger 12 Feb '06

12 Feb '06

Could somebody please check, wheter /etc/sysconfig/windowmanager in beta3 still contains this entry. It makes Konqueror on some machines very! slow on 9.X and 10.0. Thanks. -- Mit freundlichen Grüßen, Marcel Hilzinger Linux New Media AG Süskindstr. 4 D-81929 München Tel: +49 (89) 99 34 11 0 Fax: +49 (89) 99 34 11 99

9 22

SCSI Workaround
by Günther J. Niederwimmer 12 Feb '06

12 Feb '06

Hello, Know any a Workaround, to install SL10.1 Beta3 on a SCSI system with adaptec aic7890/91 Ultra 2 SCSI, is possible ? -- mit freundlichen Grüßen / best Regards, Günther J. Niederwimmer

1 0