claude-noether
693e9b42aa
Two readiness gaps surfaced after the end-to-end install verification on
ohm 2026-05-08:
(1) The "Building" section was a one-liner ("makepkg -s ... pacman -U
... reboot") with no actual install commands. Replaced with proper
Building / Installing / Verifying / Rolling back sections, using
the exact commands that worked end-to-end on ohm:
- sudo pacman -U <pkg.tar.zst>
- The new conflicts/provides metadata means no --overwrite needed
- PineTab2 U-Boot script update via /boot/boot.txt + mkscr
- Off-device backup (boot.scr.pre-besser) for trivial rollback
- Post-reboot checks: uname -r, lsmod, /sys/module/bes2600/srcversion
(2) The "What's in the patchset" table listed Patch G / Patch B / etc.
without linking to the actual commits. Added a preamble pointer to
the cleanups branch on marfrit/bes2600-dkms gitea, which is the
source-of-truth for individual commits + Phase-7 verification logs.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.7 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
7.2 KiB
linux-pinetab2-danctnix-besser
Soft-upstream fork of linux-pinetab2 (DanctNIX kernel for PineTab2) carrying the BESser bes2600 staging-driver patchset.
Drop-in replacement for linux-pinetab2. Same kernel version, same config, same modules — only the drivers/staging/bes2600/ driver differs.
What's in the patchset
A 16-commit cumulative diff over v7.0-danctnix1's in-tree drivers/staging/bes2600/, capturing the patch groups below.
Individual commits with full rationale + Phase-7 verification logs live on the cleanups branch of marfrit/bes2600-dkms — this PKGBUILD ships them squashed (one cumulative diff) for build atomicity.
| group | what it does |
|---|---|
| c-stack (Patches A, B, c5.1–c5.2.1, c6.1, c6.2, c7) | wifi-stability fixes: decrypt-storm fast-recover, connection-loss bus-reset, scan-defer-on-firmware-reject, PM state resync, firmware-doesn't-honour-PSM self-detect, multi-function SDIO mmc_hw_reset rescan |
| Patch F | cw1200 mainline backports: hw_scan SKB-lifecycle UAF, init_common destroy_workqueue on error, atomic_add(1, x) → atomic_inc(x) cosmetic |
| Patch C v3 | structural: drop sdio_rx_work workqueue relay; IRQ → bh-direct architecture (matches mainline cw1200) |
| Patch G | GPL-2.0 §1 attribution restoration: SPDX-License-Identifier on every file, Tarnyagin/ST-Ericsson Copyright restored on cw1200-derived files |
| Patch D | ba_lock removed; ba_acc/ba_cnt/ba_acc_rx/ba_cnt_rx/ba_ena converted to atomic_t; per-RX-frame spinlock eliminated |
| Patch E | per-RX-frame ps_state_lock skipped when c7's pm_unsupported latch is on (steady-state on production firmware) |
| Patch C2 | ieee80211_rx_irqsafe → ieee80211_rx_ni at all 6 sites (kernel.org-clean process-context API; tasklet hop removed) |
| Patch H | bh.c hygiene cleanup: 76-line + 468-line #if 0 cw1200-ancestor fossil blocks removed; __bes2600_irq_enable stub removed; per-iteration BUG_ON → WARN_ON_ONCE |
Measured outcome (Mobian-flavor verification, expected to carry over)
- Phase 7 N=3 stress @ 4 MB/s sender on RK3566/PineTab2:
- Patch B baseline: 1.36 MB/s
- Patch C v3 + F + G + D + E + C2 + H: 2.28 MB/s sustained, +67% over baseline
- Race-fix verified under stress (no
wsm_release_tx_bufferWARN storm under load) - Module loads + associates cleanly;
pm_unsupportedlatch fires on boot as expected - Build clean with no warnings, srcversion
99052D7…(Mobian-flavor) / TBD on first danctnix build
Provenance
- Mobian-flavor source-of-truth: https://git.reauktion.de/marfrit/bes2600-dkms (cleanups branch)
- Per-patch breakdown + Phase 7 results: https://git.reauktion.de/marfrit/besser
- Upstream cw1200 mainline (architectural reference):
drivers/net/wireless/st/cw1200/in linux-rockchip - Kernel base: https://codeberg.org/DanctNIX/linux-pinetab2 tag
v7.0-danctnix1
Why it's "BESser"
"Besser" = German for "better." Patch series ID across both DKMS (Mobian) and in-tree (Danctnix) trees. Single source-of-truth lives in marfrit/bes2600-dkms; this PKGBUILD is the danctnix-flavor consumption surface.
Building
makepkg -s
Identical workflow to upstream linux-pinetab2. Produces linux-pinetab2-danctnix-besser-<ver>-aarch64.pkg.tar.zst plus a matching -headers package. Build host can be aarch64 native (recommended — no cross-toolchain setup) or x86 with an aarch64 cross-compiler.
Build time: ~45–55 min on an 8-core aarch64 host (boltzmann/RPi5-class), most of it the kernel modules phase.
Installing
The package declares provides=("linux-pinetab2=$pkgver-$pkgrel") and conflicts=(linux-pinetab2), so pacman will cleanly take over from upstream linux-pinetab2:
sudo pacman -U linux-pinetab2-danctnix-besser-7.0.danctnix1-1-aarch64.pkg.tar.zst
That removes the upstream linux-pinetab2 package (if installed) and registers the BESser-flavored kernel under the same provides slot. Headers package is optional; install it if you build out-of-tree modules.
The pacman mkinitcpio hook auto-generates /boot/initramfs-linux-pinetab2-danctnix-besser.img. Modules land in /usr/lib/modules/<release>-pinetab2-danctnix-besser/, vmlinuz at /boot/vmlinuz-linux-pinetab2-danctnix-besser, DTBs at /boot/dtbs/rockchip/rk3566-pinetab2-{v0.1,v2.0}.dtb.
Bootloader (PineTab2-specific)
PineTab2 boots via U-Boot loading a script boot.scr (compiled from /boot/boot.txt via mkscr). After install, point the script at the new kernel + initramfs:
sudo cp /boot/boot.txt /boot/boot.txt.pre-besser
sudo cp /boot/boot.scr /boot/boot.scr.pre-besser
sudo sed -i \
-e 's|/vmlinuz-linux-pinetab2$|/vmlinuz-linux-pinetab2-danctnix-besser|' \
-e 's|/initramfs-linux-pinetab2\.img|/initramfs-linux-pinetab2-danctnix-besser.img|' \
/boot/boot.txt
cd /boot && sudo ./mkscr
sudo systemctl reboot
Backups (*.pre-besser) let you revert without touching the U-Boot console: sudo cp /boot/boot.scr.pre-besser /boot/boot.scr and reboot.
Verifying
After reboot:
uname -r
# expected: <kver>-pinetab2-danctnix-besser
lsmod | grep -i bes2600
# expected: bes2600 (loaded), bes2600_btuart (loaded if Bluetooth in use)
cat /sys/module/bes2600/srcversion
# expected: a srcversion distinct from the upstream linux-pinetab2 module
dmesg | grep bes2600 should show clean firmware load, no SDIO TX panic, no wsm_release_tx_buffer WARN storm under load.
Rolling back
If the new kernel misbehaves:
sudo cp /boot/boot.scr.pre-besser /boot/boot.scr
sudo systemctl reboot
That returns you to whatever kernel boot.scr was pointing at before the install (typically upstream linux-pinetab2 or the previous linux-pinetab2-danctnix-besser). The package itself can be removed with sudo pacman -R linux-pinetab2-danctnix-besser and the original linux-pinetab2 re-installed via sudo pacman -S linux-pinetab2.
Soft-upstream intent
Submitting this PKGBUILD to DanctNIX for review. If accepted as a replacement for linux-pinetab2 (or sidegrade), the BESser patchset ships to all PineTab2 users via the regular danctnix package update channel. The bes2600 driver gets:
- ~2× sustained RX throughput
- Race-correctness on the hot path
- GPL-2.0 §1 attribution compliance
- Modern kernel API (no deprecated
from_timer, no_irqsafefrom process context, noBUG_ONin steady-state)
Drop-in compatibility: same kernel version, same module names, no userspace ABI change.
Maintenance plan
- New danctnix kernel release → rebase BESser patch onto the new tag, regenerate cumulative diff, bump pkgver
- New BESser patch on Mobian DKMS → re-overlay + re-flavor + regenerate cumulative diff
- Both flavors continue to be maintained in lockstep via
marfrit/bes2600-dkmssource-of-truth
Known gaps
- Single cumulative diff (squashed 16 commits) for now. Per-patch series can be regenerated if danctnix maintainers prefer.
- Bluetooth-side
bes2600_btuartis independent and untouched by this patchset. bes2600_switch_btorchestration removed (Mobian-only entry point; not used in danctnix tree).
Author
Markus Fritsche fritsche.markus@gmail.com
Built collaboratively with Claude Opus 4.7 (1M context).