Improving FreeBSD's hardware compatibility

[Intron]

John-Mark Gurney wrote:

> Intron wrote this message on Thu, Jul 20, 2006 at 19:25 +0800:
>> On the other hand, so many hardware vendors (especially some small
>> enterprises, which are eager to obtain software support)
>> have publicized data sheets of their integrated circuit products,
>> but so few people would write hardware driver for FreeBSD.
> 
> I haven't seen this.  The only case that I can think of is due to
> developers not having the hardware, or a need to use said hardware,
> so nothing happens...
> 
> Do you have a list of hardware that has documntation available that
> needs device drivers to be written?
> 
> -- 
>   John-Mark Gurney				Voice: +1 415 225 5579
> 
>      "All that I will do, has been done, All that I have, has not."
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Well, I list all hardware products whose data sheets I've seen and which
haven't been supported by FreeBSD.

1. Cologne Chip - HFC-S PCI A ISDN Controller IC
    http://www.colognechip.com/isdn/controllers/main-datasheets.htm

       FreeBSD only supports ihfc(4), its ISA version, but doesn't
support this PCI version.

2. Sigmatel - STIR 4200, USB 1.1 - IrDA 1.3 adapter
    The data sheet was once published on their website. Both Linux and
NetBSD support this chip.

3. Philips SAA 7130/7134, TV decoder
    This is one of the most popular TV decoder chips on the market.
The data sheet can be obtained from the vendor, just as what Linux
community has done.

4. USB MIDI device class
    http://www.usb.org/developers/devclass_docs

5. USB IrDA device class
    http://www.usb.org/developers/devclass_docs

      Some new USB-IrDA chips conform to this specification.

6. TI 3410/5052 USB-RS232C adapter
    http://focus.ti.com/docs/prod/folders/print/tusb3410.html
    http://focus.ti.com/docs/prod/folders/print/tusb5052.html

      Please have a look at those Linux device drive websites and perceive
the disparity that FreeBSD falls behind:

Modem:               http://linmodems.org/
Video:               http://linux.bytesex.org/
Temperature sensor:  http://www.lm-sensors.org/
USB PC Camera:       http://mxhaard.free.fr/spca5xx.html

      Although not all data sheets have been publicized by vendors, but
at least FreeBSDers can follow/keep up with Linux community, cannot we?

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