Arch Linux

nouveau

Member

From: Germany

Registered: 2011-01-16

Posts: 12

ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

Today I wanted to update my PC and pacman said ":: ndiswrapper: benötigt kernel26<2.6.39". Then I made an "pacman -Ss ndiswrapper" and looked in the Packages list, but ndiswrapper wasn't found.

Is that intentional or just an error?

Ramses de Norre

Member

From: Leuven - Belgium

Registered: 2007-03-27

Posts: 1,289

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

http://mailman.archlinux.org/pipermail/ … 20609.html

JokerBoy

Member

From: România

Registered: 2009-09-24

Posts: 641

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

http://mailman.archlinux.org/pipermail/ … 20609.html

too slow..

Last edited by JokerBoy (2011-06-11 12:28:11)

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nouveau

Member

From: Germany

Registered: 2011-01-16

Posts: 12

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

"- ndiswrapper (not needed anymore)"

Why? It is needed for People who can't use native linux drivers, or is there an alternative which I don't know?

vacant

Member

From: downstairs

Registered: 2004-11-05

Posts: 816

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

or is there an alternative which I don't know?

Various ndiswrappers in AUR.

Without further info (or improved telepathy ), we don't know if there is an alternative for your personal setup.

Lone_Wolf

Forum Moderator

From: Netherlands, Europe

Registered: 2005-10-04

Posts: 11,969

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

Ndiswrapper was used for drivers for network/wireless chipsets that didn't have native linux versions, but how many of those are left ?

example :  The Broadcom chipsets are now supported in kernel since 2.6.37

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Disliking systemd intensely, but not satisfied with alternatives so focusing on taming systemd.

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nouveau

Member

From: Germany

Registered: 2011-01-16

Posts: 12

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

Thats right, but my Wlan USB Stick ist still unsupported under Linux because of an violation of the GPL License in an previous driver I read. Then I hope the AUR Version will work properly, if not, I have a big problem. Too bad, because I like Arch, but without Internet it doesn't make such fun as now...

Ramses de Norre

Member

From: Leuven - Belgium

Registered: 2007-03-27

Posts: 1,289

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

You can always build the package yourself, grab the pkgbuild from arch's svn.

4javier

Member

From: Italia

Registered: 2010-12-01

Posts: 115

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

This is one of the choice I'll never understand:
Is it obsolete? No.
Is it deprecated? No.
Is it buggy? No. (to be honest, it is. But, in my case, much less than the alternative)
Is it useful? Yes.
Then, why take it off the official repos?
This is my condition using rt2500usb: http://rt2x00.serialmonkey.com/phpBB/vi … ccc#p34639 , and no reply so far. If this is an official project, included into mainstream kernel, I think ndiswrapper could be helpful to many people.

yawns

Member

Registered: 2010-05-31

Posts: 68

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

This is one of the choice I'll never understand:
Is it obsolete? No.
Is it deprecated? No.
Is it buggy? No. (to be honest, it is. But, in my case, much less than the alternative)
Is it useful? Yes.
Then, why take it off the official repos?
This is my condition using rt2500usb: http://rt2x00.serialmonkey.com/phpBB/vi … ccc#p34639 , and no reply so far. If this is an official project, included into mainstream kernel, I think ndiswrapper could be helpful to many people.

I also have an RT2500 card. I can't believe how flippant the decision to remove ndiswrapper was. "Not needed anymore." Says who? Why remove a package that has no issues and is useful?

Ramses de Norre

Member

From: Leuven - Belgium

Registered: 2007-03-27

Posts: 1,289

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

You guys should file a bug report, that's the only way to get the dev's attention. This might have been a mistake, or maybe there is a sensible explanation.

Gleighton

Member

Registered: 2011-06-12

Posts: 1

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

So I did: https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/24705

Rupp

Member

Registered: 2010-02-14

Posts: 47

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

So I did: https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/24705

Thanks, but I can see it was of no use. I know a lot of devices are supported natively, but that doesn't mean they work well. Mine is supported natively, but it is too flaky to do anything. I know even though a lot of devices  are supported, I've heard quite a few cases(my device included) where people have mentioned Ad-Hoc didn't work with the native drivers.

fiddlinmacx

Member

Registered: 2011-03-02

Posts: 89

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

I know it's a pain - I have a TrendNet PCMCIA card that I can only get working with ndiswrapper. However, I upgraded the kernel, installed ndiswrapper-utils with 'downgrade' and ndiswrapper from the AUR and everything works fine.

4javier

Member

From: Italia

Registered: 2010-12-01

Posts: 115

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

Please people, if you need ndiswrapper, vote for the bug opened by Gleighton and eventually leave a comment. If many people needs it, devs could consider to re-include it into core repo, otherwise if we are just 4-5...it's right it stay off.

yawns

Member

Registered: 2010-05-31

Posts: 68

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

Please people, if you need ndiswrapper, vote for the bug opened by Gleighton and eventually leave a comment. If many people needs it, devs could consider to re-include it into core repo, otherwise if we are just 4-5...it's right it stay off.

I'm lucky in that I generally use a wired network on this PC. My wireless card has been useless since the last update. I registered and voted just because I'm shocked at the complete lack of thought or concern put into the decision to remove this package, and that they had the audacity to immediately close the request because, "It's in AUR." Like you said in your comment over there: If that's their line of thinking, then why don't the 5 people who made this decision just move everything they don't personally rely on to AUR.

ngoonee

Forum Fellow

From: Between Thailand and Singapore

Registered: 2009-03-17

Posts: 7,356

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

<snip> why don't the 5 people who made this decision just move everything they don't personally rely on to AUR.

That's what the devs do. If its not in the repos, that means no dev/TU thought it important enough. Which means noone on the team actually uses it. Being dropped to the AUR allows someone who actually uses the package to maintain it, rather than a dev/TU who doesn't.

Those who need ndiswrapper can use the AUR, is it really that hard? Downloading the tarball and source rather than just the compiled binary?

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karol

Archivist

Registered: 2009-05-06

Posts: 25,440

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

Anyone tried to build http://aur.archlinux.org/packages.php?ID=49709 ? It's the package that used to be in the repos and got dropped. It mentions ndiswrapper-utils in the dependencies but ... where can one find ndiswrapper-utils?

Rupp

Member

Registered: 2010-02-14

Posts: 47

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

Anyone tried to build http://aur.archlinux.org/packages.php?ID=49709 ? It's the package that used to be in the repos and got dropped. It mentions ndiswrapper-utils in the dependencies but ... where can one find ndiswrapper-utils?

If you have the old ndiswrapper-utils it should be in your pacman cache already. If you don't have it you could probably grab it from http://schlunix.org/archlinux/ I built it with the one I already had in my cache. Though I shouldn't of had to build it.

BTW: Still no problems with the video card. Everything is still working great. Hope it is still the same for you

karol

Archivist

Registered: 2009-05-06

Posts: 25,440

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

That's what I told https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=120957 - grab an old package.
I still think ndiswrapper-utils should be dropped to AUR alongside ndiswrapper. If it doesn't appear in there tomorrow, I'll file a bug report.

And my poor old video card is doing just fine :-)

4javier

Member

From: Italia

Registered: 2010-12-01

Posts: 115

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

Post here in reply to Brain0 comment just cause I don't want to re-re-open a bug already re-closed. As I've previously written, I tried to file a bugtrack for my problems with native driver, but nobody seems to care about that. Other people said they did the same. For us, ndiswrapper hasn't been a way to to avoid trying to help to solve bug, but an extrema ratio.

Bye

alfmel

Member

Registered: 2010-01-10

Posts: 17

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

Those who need ndiswrapper can use the AUR, is it really that hard? Downloading the tarball and source rather than just the compiled binary?

Actually, for something dealing with network connectivity, yes. First, download the AUR package, then have it build enough to download the package while you have network connectivity. Then, upgrade the rest of the system, boot with the new kernel. Then, you continue to build the AUR package and hope it builds without problems. If it doesn't, then you have find a wired connection, research why the thing won't build, hope there is a fix, and then you go on your way.

If it was something less crucial, like plymouth, yeah you live with it. But when you can't connect to the Internet to research the problem on why you can't connect to the Internet? That's a problem.

Frankly, I'm scared to update my system. I don't want to spend 2 hours trying to get my system up and running after "upgrading". I've had to do that before with buggy X drivers.

Last edited by alfmel (2011-06-16 06:24:44)

alfmel

Member

Registered: 2010-01-10

Posts: 17

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

According to https://www.archlinux.de/?page=PackageStatistics 5.38% of users have this package installed. <sarcasm>Yeah,nobody uses this package anymore.</sarcasm>

Yes, perhaps we should report our problems upstream. But, some of us have reported them and received little help. Just like we are now receiving little help from the Arch Linux community in our hour of need. Perhaps all those calling for us to report problems would like to represent the Arch Linux community and submit those upstream? After all, upstream is much more willing to listen to distribution maintainers than individual users. For those of us who have submitted bug reports, how many times have you been told the problem might be a distribution problem because the developer can't reproduce it?

I appreciate the efforts by the Arch Linux developers to create a better, more perfect world. However, reality for some of us is far from perfect. I'm all for making ndiswrapper truly obsolete. But, the better way to do that is to fix all the buggy native drivers first, then remove a truly unneeded package.

MrCode

Member

Registered: 2010-02-06

Posts: 373

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

My desktop machine has a Netgear WN111v1 USB WNIC (Marvell TopDog chipset), which has no native driver (in-kernel or otherwise) yet, so I have to use ndiswrapper + the Windows driver.

Here's what I did when the update rolled around that complained about the ndiswrapper dependency:

• Downloaded/successfully built and installed new .39-compatible ndiswrapper package from AUR

• Updated system (deps now satisfied), still running the old ndiswrapper/kernel

• Rebooted…still had wireless connection with new ndiswrapper/kernel.

…didn't seem that hard to me, but I agree that it's a bit less than convenient to have to grab it from the AUR as opposed to having a pre-built package available.  I'm not arguing, just stating my opinion, I guess…

karol

Archivist

Registered: 2009-05-06

Posts: 25,440

Re: ndiswrapper not in repos anymore?

Posted a bug report about the missing ndiswrapper-utils https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/24749