linux-kernel - Re: [PATCH] net-sysfs: Add entry for nl80211 interface type

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Message-Id: <05ECA628-AE4D-48A2-A743-4C800052F439@holtmann.org>
Date:	Thu, 18 Apr 2013 08:46:40 -0700
From:	Marcel Holtmann <marcel@...tmann.org>
To:	Paul Stewart <pstew@...omium.org>
Cc:	Nicolas Cavallari <Nicolas.Cavallari@....fr>,
	Johannes Berg <johannes@...solutions.net>,
	Bing Zhao <bzhao@...vell.com>, linux-netdev@...r.kernel.org,
	linux-wireless <linux-wireless@...r.kernel.org>,
	LKML <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>
Subject: Re: [PATCH] net-sysfs: Add entry for nl80211 interface type

Hi Paul,

> The original reason to request this change was simple: to figure out
> what type of interface we are looking at, since now some wireless
> drivers can simultaneously create managed, p2p and ap interfaces.
> Knowing that, from a simple front-end (let's even say a shell script)
> we can decide what arguments to use with wpa_supplicant (or indeed if
> we want to start it on this interface).  wpa_supplicant, of course,
> knows how to manipulate the device further using nl80211.  I thought
> it was a bit onerous to force userspace all the way through nl80211
> just to get this trivial piece of information, but apparently this
> doesn't seem to be the common point of view.

quite frankly this is a design issue with wpa_supplicant since it refuses to manage the wireless devices and interfaces. If you would have a real daemon that manages the wireless device via nl80211, then you would never ever have this problem. All the information are available via nl80211.

However my point is that you can not just base this around netdev exposed interfaces. The netdev interface might not even be present. Especially when talking about P2P you might not have a netdev in the first place. You only have a wdev.

Regards

Marcel

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