How we can use 21.02 packages from snapshot

Installing and Using OpenWrt
1

Hi guys,
I'm a Xiaomi AC2100 owner for which support has been recently added but no stable release is available yet, so I'm currently using snapshot builds for this router.
The biggest issue is that I often have to upgrade it to a newer snapshot in order to be able to install additional kernel modules and as you know this is time consuming.
I'm monitoring the https://downloads.openwrt.org/ page waiting for a 21.02 RC build (news on that? :slight_smile: ), but in the meantime I noticed a "packages-21.02" folder under releases (https://downloads.openwrt.org/releases/packages-21.02/)...
What is this folder for?
I thought that snapshot builds use packages from (https://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/packages/) so I'm a bit confused.
Are packages from releases/packages-21.02 still rebuilt every night or they are considered stable?
In that case, how can I use these packages instead of the snapshot ones?
Thank you and sorry for the silly question but as I said, I'm a bit confused.

1 Like
2

Ok I think I can reply to myself.
kmod packages are NOT in the packages folder (this only includes userspace packages) but rather in the target folder. It seems that kmod snapshot packages are kept for every build (https://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/targets/ramips/mt7621/kmods/) and I can install them without any problem without upgrading.
The problem is with userspace packages that depend on newer versions of these kernel modules. In that case I will not be able to install them, but I think this is fine.

I'm just wondering what happens when a openwrt stable release is finally released. I imagine that kmod packages are frozen for that specif release, but does it means that developers of userspace packages can NOT updage a kmod dependency, right? If they do, users will not be able to install that package without upgrading the whole router, right?

Thank you!

oh, and I still don't fully understand the difference between https://downloads.openwrt.org/releases/packages-21.02/ and https://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/packages/ :smiley:

Oh, I see now, there is this hidden folder... http://downloads.openwrt.org/releases/21.02-SNAPSHOT
So they are both "snapshot" but one is from branch master and the other one is from the 21.02 branch.

3

???

  • The kmod must always match the kernel version
  • A release uses a specific kernel version
  • See: https://openwrt.org/releases/snapshot
  • :notebook: : A "versioned" snapshot (e.g. 21.02-SNAPSHOT) is not the same as the normal SNAPSHOT directory
  • :warning: You have to upgrade the firmware anyway or risk bricking your device - search the forum for many horror stories or advice against upgrading packages en masse
  • The kernel cannot be upgraded without flashing the firmware anyways
  • The SNAPSHOT directory will continue, see the link above for more details
    • the versioned snapshot is a "forking" in preparation for version 21.02.x, the release candidates, etc.

Hope this helps.

4

Thank you for the reply,
however I still not understand how userspace packages with a dependency to a newer kmod package are managed.
Please consider this example here:

  • a user has OW 19.7.6 installed with some kmod package (let's say kmod-tun) version 1.0; there is also a userspace package (let's say tun-utilities) that depends on kmod-tun 1.0
  • then, the developer of tun-utilities updates the package dependencies saying that it depends on kmod-tun 1.1

How can the user install the new version of tun-utilities? Because he cannot upgrade the kmod-tun without upgrading the whole system.

5

Your example makes little sense. Such doesn't occur in releases.

1 Like