[Bug 5048] New: mdev does not send "don't have it" message for missing firmware

[bugzilla at busybox.net]

https://bugs.busybox.net/show_bug.cgi?id=5048

           Summary: mdev does not send "don't have it" message for missing
                    firmware
           Product: Busybox
           Version: 1.19.x
          Platform: PC
        OS/Version: Linux
            Status: NEW
          Severity: minor
          Priority: P5
         Component: Other
        AssignedTo: unassigned at busybox.net
        ReportedBy: danthau at gmail.com
                CC: busybox-cvs at busybox.net
   Estimated Hours: 0.0


With Linux 3.1 I had no issues.  With Linux 3.2 (and now 3.3) and mdev, I found
a delay of one minute between "modprobe iwlwifi" and wlan0 showing up with
"iwconfig" or "iw dev".  With udev, this delay completely disappears.

I inquired about it in #linux-networking on freenode, and was informed the
following:

17:31:35         johill | between 3.1 and 3.2 we bumped the firmware api
version to 6, but then we could never release api 6
17:31:45         johill | so we request iwlwifi-100-6.ucode first
17:31:52         johill | and when that fails, we request iwlwifi-100-5.ucode
...
17:32:21         johill | so the -6 request still goes out to mdev, which
should return "don't have it" right away, but apparently doesn't
17:32:35         johill | udev apparently does return "don't have it"

In summary, mdev does not seem to send the "don't have it" message the Linux
kernel exppects in response to requests for firmware it cannot find, which
results an a minute-long delay whenever one tries to load the driver for such
hardware.

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