[LEDE-DEV] [RFC] kernel-packages: new package (adapted from `kernel` package from core)

[Alexandru Ardelean]

Hey,

A while back I opened a PR:
https://github.com/openwrt/packages/pull/4407

Etienne prompted me to try the ML too.

The gist of it is:
g1) LEDE core does not want to package all/certain in-tree kmods
(bloat reasons, which is reasonable)
g2) The `packages` feed would like to have certain in-tree kmods for
certain packages

There are 2 ways to handle this [minor conflict]:
w1) each package in the feed packages it's own in-tree kmod
w2) spin a copy of the core's `kernel` meta-package, and package kmods there

I have no idea about the implications/side-effects [on bloat or
whatever] of  w2).
Hence the RFC tag.
The only benefits I see:
a) it's a centralized package, where in-tree kmods [from core's
kernel] would reside [which sounds nice]
b) re-building the kmod would not require re-building the package
[hopefully i did not misunderstand build dependency logic here]
c) if another package would depend only on the kmod, it would need not
re-build the entire package [ that defines it in the package feed ]

I'm fine with either w1) or w2).

So, far, it's only OVS that touches on this.

The reason I prompted to spin up this RFC is seeing this [with
ipvsadm/Load Balancer thingi] :
i) https://github.com/lede-project/source/pull/936
ii) https://github.com/lede-project/source/pull/936/commits/05f3f8576291e6f0d59069d0f0a75aa0363db4bc

For the kmods, I can agree the addition is big, but maybe it could
make sense to have this package in such a `kernel-packages` package.

Thanks
Alex