From fb6cf1fe6824097215db21ae26fd27d5877b229e Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Dan Williams Date: Wed, 24 Aug 2011 10:17:36 -0500 Subject: [PATCH] todo: add some notes about tablet/mobile optimizations we should do --- TODO | 31 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ 1 file changed, 31 insertions(+) diff --git a/TODO b/TODO index 369be1e560..1e82526d9a 100644 --- a/TODO +++ b/TODO @@ -495,3 +495,34 @@ a bridge or bond and shouldn't be automatically started by NetworkManager or displayed as separate connections in the user interface. TO BE CONTINUED + + +* Better Tablet/Mobile Behavior + +There are a few components to this: + +1) kernel driver and hardware capabilities: most mobile devices use periodic +background scanning to quickly determine whether a known SSID is available and +notify the connection manager to connect to it. This typically requires special +capabilities and good powersave/sleep support from the WiFi kernel driver. +There is a background scanning API in nl80211, but we need to determine how many +SSIDs each driver allows for background scanning, and based on that number, give +the driver the most recent N SSIDs. We still need to periodically wake the +device up and do a full scan just in case the user is near a known SSID that was +not in the N top recently used networks. This is also beneficial to normal +desktop use-cases. + +2) single-device-at-a-time with overlapping connections: this is also probably +the best route to go for desktop use-cases as well. Instead of bringing all +available connections up, only bring up the "best" connection at any given +time based on the current priority list (which is rougly Ethernet > WiFi > +3G/Bluetooth/WiMAX). However, to ensure seamless connectivity, when one +connection begins to degrade, the next-best connection should be started before +the current one is terminated, such that there is a small amount of overlap. +Consequently the same behavior should be used when a better connection becomes +available. This behavior should be suspended when special connections like +Internet Connection Sharing ones are started, where clearly the priorities +are different (ie, for Mobile Hotspot 3G > WiFi). + + +