• nukul4r@feddit.de
    161·
    5 months ago

    This is unexpected, and hits really hard. I tried to get one of his drivers running with a fairly new USB wifi adapter, I made a Github issue, and he was super kind and helpful. This was only in May, it feels unreal to read this news. What a terrible loss, my deepest condolences to his family and friends.

  • mojo_raisin@lemmy.world
    111·
    5 months ago

    Larry Finger, your work has made a significant positive impact on my life and I’m sure many others. Thank you.

    Now can you work on a driver to allow communication between the living and the dead?

  • MXX53@programming.dev
    81·
    5 months ago

    If a random reddit post is correct and he was 84 years old, I can only hope to have the same drive and mental ability at that age. RIP.

    • Ghostface@lemmy.worldEnglish
      221·
      5 months ago

      I still say the elderly is ripe for development. Not having an issue sitting or standing for long periods of time. Plus the constant problem solving.

      There should be a way to get seniors to work with and foss keystone foss projects.

      Not to mention after they start its the monthly group meeting…

  • AutoTL;DR@lemmings.worldBEnglish
    27·
    5 months ago

    This is the best summary I could come up with:

    The Linux kernel community has sadly lost one of its longtime, prolific contributors to the wireless (WiFi) drivers.

    His wife shared the news of Larry Finger’s passing this weekend on the linux-wireless mailing list in a brief statement.

    Larry Finger began contributing originally to the Broadcom BCM43XX driver back in the day and over the years has contributed a lot to Linux WiFi drivers.

    His more recent contributions had been around the RTW88, RTW89, R8188EU, R8712, RTLWIFI, B43 and other Linux networking drivers.

    In part to his contributions, the Linux wireless hardware support has come a long way over the past two decades…

    Longtime Linux users will certainly remember the days of struggling with WiFi support, resorting to NDISWrapper for using Windows WiFi drivers on Linux, and other headaches compared to today’s largely trouble-free wireless hardware support.

    The original article contains 183 words, the summary contains 137 words. Saved 25%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!

    • MajorHavoc@programming.dev
      7·
      5 months ago

      Great summary bot, as ever. But missed this absolute gem from the comments:

      “Thanks for helping me wardrive and steal the WiFi from that dentist, Larry.”

  • potentiallynotfelix@lemdro.idEnglish
    25·
    5 months ago

    im pretty sure i’ve used his drivers one time or another across my older macbooks or in one of my usb cards. RIP to Larry, I’m sure the linux community will miss his amazing contributions.

  • ducklingone@lemmy.today
    19·
    5 months ago

    Wow Larry contributed to these old Broadcom drivers?! I’m using them to this day on my old macbook. RIP

  • SayCyberOnceMore@feddit.ukEnglish
    11·
    5 months ago

    I’m struggling with what appears to be buggy wifi on an old Lenovo laptop… I spent a moment just looking at the logs and appreciating whoever has spent time and energy trying to get this working, probably reverse engineering without any support… I wonder if that was Larry…?