06-06-2025, 08:13 PM
(12-20-2023, 11:10 AM)u974615 Wrote: This process of developing a working WiFi driver/kernel module seems a bit strange to me. Should it be more in collaboration with the Linux project and with a plain main board, not in a final form factor?
https://gitlab.com/TuxThePenguin0/bes2600
Wouldn't it be easier for someone to convince the original source code ( Bestechnic?, BES? ) to work with The Linux Foundation and get the code distributed with the Linux kernel releases. Or work with Software Freedom Conservancy and release it fully under the GPL v2, which Segfaults's GitLab repo seemed to be working toward: https://gitlab.com/TuxThePenguin0/bes2600. And figure out the proper channels and format to package and distribute the kernel module.
I gather another issue is the WiFi chipset really doesn't support the latest WiFi protocols... AC?
It is sad really, I have a PineBook Pro with Tow-Boot installed to the SPI and booting Debian Workstation (GNOME3) and it works well enough [even the WiFi and Bluetooth] to continue using a Linux Graphical Shell. More RAM, touchscreen, and detachable keyboard would be nice upgrades. these are much better form factors than the Raspberry Pi 5. Yet, the Raspberry Pi 5 has a Broadcom BCM2712 quad-core Arm Cortex A76 processor and up to 8GB of RAM.
Oddly Starlabs and Fyde Linux tablets don't have this issue. So it would seem that there is no issue at all in getting cooperation from vendors.
May be more a matter of expecting or demanding drivers be written for free.
Maybe if the leaders of foss all did it 40 hours a week themselves it wouldn't be an issue. Though that's as unsustainable as Leopold's Congo operations at least it would be the people who initiated and are pushing the model that would be driven to abject poverty and their lives devalued and so right and just,