one more time -- broadcom wireless on f7

[Robert P. J. Day]

On Tue, 14 Aug 2007, John W. Linville wrote:

> On Tue, Aug 14, 2007 at 07:04:10AM -0400, Robert P. J. Day wrote:
>
> >   so, is there, somewhere, a set of instructions that actually
> > represents a solution, and which doesn't contain the phrase "and if
> > that doesn't work, try ..." somewhere in the middle?
>
> For the BCM4318?  No.  Some 4318-based cards work w/ one driver,
> some with another, and some with neither.  Complain to Broadcom,
> or send some money to support the reverse engineering effort.
>
> 	http://bcm-v4.sipsolutions.net/
>
> Sorry, but it is as simple as that.  Perhaps we just shouldn't ship
> any driver at all until we have one that works for _you_?

  sure, that works for me.  :-)

  seriously, though, the hassle i've had with trying to get this to
work is another example of what i've found is a general shortcoming
of a lot of online documentation i've run across for years now.

  most online HOWTOs/tutorials are of the form:

* do step 1
* do step 2
...
* do step n

  there, you're done.  if it works, great.  if it doesn't, well,
sorry.  what those recipes *don't* do is explain, first of all, *why*
you're doing each step and, even more importantly, what you can do
*after* each step to verify that things are progressing correctly and
you're on the right track.

  above, you point out that some 4318-based cards work with one
driver, some with another driver and so on.  fair enough.  but is
there a way, as i'm working my way thru the configuration, to know
ASAP whether it will work for *me*?  because if there isn't, then all
i can do is go through the full configuration, only to find out at the
end that it doesn't work, at which point, i'm not sure if it's *my*
fault or whether i really have a driver/card mismatch of some kind.

  as i'm sure you can appreciate, it's maddening when you read
someone's recipe that just *worked* for them, and fails utterly for
*me*.  so i go back and start from scratch and try it again, assuming
i screwed up, never realizing that it really *isn't* my fault after
all (at least with the setup i have).

  in short, it would be nice to see some online documentation that
will explain *either* how to get something working, *or* explain how
to tell if it just can't be done in my situation, so i can stop trying
the same thing over and over, and move on to other alternatives.

rday

-- 
========================================================================
Robert P. J. Day
Linux Consulting, Training and Annoying Kernel Pedantry
Waterloo, Ontario, CANADA

http://fsdev.net/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page
========================================================================