Can anyone help - VIA VT6656 WLAN Controller - GPL source code package

Question

I recently purchased a new netbook, and I would very much like to run Arch Linux on it. I downloaded the Chakra installer USB image, copied it to a SDHC card using dd, and then booted from it. Everything appeared to go swimmingly during the installation except for the Wireless LAN device, it was simply not detected.
Unfortunately this appears to be a very obscure device. There is nothing like it mentioned on the Arch Linux wiki. I tried several ways to try to discover what the chip was, and to find a Linux driver for it. It appears to be a VIA chip, reported by lshw as a "VNT USB 802.11 Wireless lan adapter". It appears to use the VIA VT6656 wireless chipset. This one:
http://www.via.com.tw/en/products/netwo … ss/vt6656/
I tracked down a "bug" on Ubuntu forums about the chip that I think it is.
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+bug/162671
This Ubuntu bug report includes a message that, very recently, VIA have released new GPL v2 license source code for a driver for this chip. There is talk about trying to get the driver included in the Linux kernel, and other musings about the possibility of making a dkms package for it.
The source code is Version - 1.19.12, released on 02 February 2009. The source code is a 4.4 MB zip file, so it is probably too big to attach to this post.
Link to source code:
http://www.viaarena.com/default.aspx?Pa … bCatID=176
So this post is a hopeful appeal for help. I do not personally have the skills required to compile this source for myself, and thereby make a working driver for Arch from it. Would there possibly be anyone interested enough to take this on?
I would be immensely grateful if so.
Last edited by hal2k1 (2009-04-23 13:04:57)

Answer 1

A very quick-and-dirty build attempt fails here:
$ make
set -e; for d in driver; do make -C $d ; done
make[1]: Entering directory `/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver'
make -C /lib/modules/2.6.29-ARCH/build SUBDIRS=/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver modules
make[2]: Entering directory `/usr/src/linux-2.6.29-ARCH'
CC [M] /home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.o
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c: In function 'device_release_WPADEV':
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c:783: warning: assignment makes integer from pointer without a cast
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c: In function 'vntwusb_found1':
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c:902: error: 'struct net_device' has no member named 'priv'
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c: In function 'device_open':
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c:1208: error: 'struct net_device' has no member named 'priv'
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c: In function 'device_close':
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c:1351: error: 'struct net_device' has no member named 'priv'
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c: In function 'device_dma0_tx_80211':
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c:1510: error: 'struct net_device' has no member named 'priv'
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c: In function 'device_xmit':
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c:1538: error: 'struct net_device' has no member named 'priv'
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c: In function 'Config_FileOperation':
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c:1663: error: 'struct task_struct' has no member named 'fsuid'
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c:1664: error: 'struct task_struct' has no member named 'fsgid'
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c:1665: error: 'struct task_struct' has no member named 'fsuid'
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c:1666: error: 'struct task_struct' has no member named 'fsgid'
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c:1700: error: 'struct task_struct' has no member named 'fsuid'
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c:1701: error: 'struct task_struct' has no member named 'fsgid'
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c: In function 'device_set_multi':
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c:1766: error: 'struct net_device' has no member named 'priv'
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c: In function 'device_get_stats':
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c:1831: error: 'struct net_device' has no member named 'priv'
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c: In function 'device_ioctl':
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c:1838: error: 'struct net_device' has no member named 'priv'
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c: In function 'vntwusb_init_module':
/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.c:2387: error: implicit declaration of function 'info'
make[3]: *** [/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver/main_usb.o] Error 1
make[2]: *** [_module_/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver] Error 2
make[2]: Leaving directory `/usr/src/linux-2.6.29-ARCH'
make[1]: *** [default] Error 2
make[1]: Leaving directory `/home/tomk/src/VT6656_Linux_src_v1.19_12_x86/driver'
make: *** [all] Error 2
It's possible the 1.19.12 release needs a kernel older than our current 2.6.29 version.
Oh, and the Arch "automated package compiler script" is called makepkg, and it's the heart of the Arch Build System (ABS). Full details available in the wiki.