ndisgtk/ndiswrapper on the install images

[Dmitrijs Ledkovs]

On 7 November 2012 12:55, Dmitrijs Ledkovs <dmitrij.ledkov at ubuntu.com> wrote:
> As part of the ongoing goal to remove python2 from the installation
> media [1] ndisgtk was identified to still be using python2, pygtk and
> python-glade2.
>
> Are there plans to port ndisgtk to python3, pygi and gtkbuilder ?
> Is ndisgtk still needed? Or can ubuntu-drivers-common take over this
> functionality.
>
> Would it be acceptable to drop the ndisgtk (GUI, not the command line
> ndiswrapper-utils) from the install images?
> The current instructions/documentation for ndiswrapper do list both
> ndisgtk and command line way of installing windows drivers. [2]
>
> I do want to question the need for ndiswrapper on the install media in
> recent years: (i) given that all major computer manufacturers ship
> ubuntu pre-installed and (ii) preferred way to get the windows driver
> is over the network [2] (iii) and the steps to manually retrieve
> windows drivers from a windows installation are harder to follow than
> ndiswrapper command-line instructions.
>

It turns out that ndiswrapper linux kernel module was dropped, as far
back as during precise development or possibly before that.
At the time ndiswrapper module was dropped, ndiswrapper-dkms was not seeded.

I have now opened a bug to drop bogus provides:ndiswrapper from the
linux kernel [3].

And I would like to raise a merge proposal to ubuntu seeds to do one of:
* to drop ndiswrapper-common, ndiswrapper-utils-1.9, ndisgtk from all seeds
* seed ndiswrapper-dkms

I am in favor of dropping the whole lot from the images as they are
currently useless for the "offline" case since kernel module is not on
the installation media.
Alternatively, if this was a mistake, dkms module should be seeded.

[3] https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/1076395

Regards,

Dmitrijs


>
> [1] https://blueprints.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+spec/foundations-r-python-versions
> [2] https://help.ubuntu.com/community/WifiDocs/Driver/Ndiswrapper
>
> --
> Regards,
>
> Dmitrijs.