ULTS 24 linux 6.8.0-22 modules misversioned

[Peter Grandi]

I get unexpected symbol versioning errors on loading a WiFi module, both built-in and external:

This is the built-in version:

petal# find /lib/modules/6.8.0-22-generic -name 'rtw88*8821ce*'
/lib/modules/6.8.0-22-generic/kernel/drivers/net/wireless/realtek/rtw88/rtw88_8821ce.ko.zst
petal# dpkg -S /lib/modules/6.8.0-22-generic/kernel/drivers/net/wireless/realtek/rtw88/rtw88_8821ce.ko.zst
linux-modules-extra-6.8.0-22-generic: /lib/modules/6.8.0-22-generic/kernel/drivers/net/wireless/realtek/rtw88/rtw88_8821ce.ko.zst
petal# modinfo /lib/modules/6.8.0-22-generic/kernel/drivers/net/wireless/realtek/rtw88/rtw88_8821ce.ko.zst | head -15
filename: /lib/modules/6.8.0-22-generic/kernel/drivers/net/wireless/realtek/rtw88/rtw88_8821ce.ko.zst
license: Dual BSD/GPL
description: Realtek 802.11ac wireless 8821ce driver
author: Realtek Corporation
srcversion: D25FEEBE76FF505B9FB2F23
alias: pci:v000010ECd0000C821sv*sd*bc*sc*i*
alias: pci:v000010ECd0000B821sv*sd*bc*sc*i*
depends: rtw88_pci,rtw88_8821c
retpoline: Y
intree: Y
name: rtw88_8821ce
vermagic: 6.8.0-22-generic SMP preempt mod_unload modversions
sig_id: PKCS#7
signer: Build time autogenerated kernel key
sig_key: 6B:5D:B5:AB:9C:C5:55:DE:5D:86:F6:60:36:C5:0D:F0:A3:E2:6D:37

petal# journalctl --since 'Apr 14 15:20:00' --grep rtw _TRANSPORT=kernel |& head -10
Apr 14 15:20:32 petal.ty.sabi.co.uk kernel: rtw_core: disagrees about version of symbol ieee80211_connection_loss
Apr 14 15:20:32 petal.ty.sabi.co.uk kernel: rtw_core: Unknown symbol ieee80211_connection_loss (err -22)
Apr 14 15:20:32 petal.ty.sabi.co.uk kernel: rtw_core: disagrees about version of symbol ieee80211_report_wowlan_wakeup
Apr 14 15:20:32 petal.ty.sabi.co.uk kernel: rtw_core: Unknown symbol ieee80211_report_wowlan_wakeup (err -22)
Apr 14 15:20:32 petal.ty.sabi.co.uk kernel: rtw_core: disagrees about version of symbol ieee80211_txq_get_depth
Apr 14 15:20:32 petal.ty.sabi.co.uk kernel: rtw_core: Unknown symbol ieee80211_txq_get_depth (err -22)
Apr 14 15:20:32 petal.ty.sabi.co.uk kernel: rtw_core: disagrees about version of symbol ieee80211_probereq_get
Apr 14 15:20:32 petal.ty.sabi.co.uk kernel: rtw_core: Unknown symbol ieee80211_probereq_get (err -22)
Apr 14 15:20:32 petal.ty.sabi.co.uk kernel: rtw_core: disagrees about version of symbol ieee80211_iterate_stations_atomic
Apr 14 15:20:32 petal.ty.sabi.co.uk kernel: rtw_core: Unknown symbol ieee80211_iterate_stations_atomic (err -22)

petal# grep ieee80211_txq_get_depth /lib/modules/6.8.0-22-generic/modules.symbols
alias symbol:ieee80211_txq_get_depth mac80211
petal# find /lib/modules/6.8.0-22-generic -name 'mac80211.ko*'
/lib/modules/6.8.0-22-generic/kernel/net/mac80211/mac80211.ko.zst
petal# dpkg -S /lib/modules/6.8.0-22-generic/kernel/net/mac80211/mac80211.ko.zst
linux-modules-extra-6.8.0-22-generic: /lib/modules/6.8.0-22-generic/kernel/net/mac80211/mac80211.ko.zst
petal# modinfo /lib/modules/6.8.0-22-generic/kernel/net/mac80211/mac80211.ko.zst | head -14
filename: /lib/modules/6.8.0-22-generic/kernel/net/mac80211/mac80211.ko.zst
license: GPL
description: IEEE 802.11 subsystem
srcversion: B64ACC886876782FBE75414
depends: cfg80211,libarc4
retpoline: Y
intree: Y
name: mac80211
vermagic: 6.8.0-22-generic SMP preempt mod_unload modversions
sig_id: PKCS#7
signer: Build time autogenerated kernel key
sig_key: 6B:5D:B5:AB:9C:C5:55:DE:5D:86:F6:60:36:C5:0D:F0:A3:E2:6D:37
sig_hashalgo: sha512
signature: 03:6C:13:64:42:90:35:16:C4:D7:5A:CD:DB:46:BC:7A:0C:7A:29:8C:

That looks like to me a packaging error, but then I compiled also an unofficial version of the driver from sources:

petal# git remote -v
origin https://github.com/lwfinger/rtw88 (fetch)
origin https://github.com/lwfinger/rtw88 (push)
petal# ls -ld rtw_8821ce.ko
-rw------- 1 root src 609816 Apr 14 21:57 rtw_8821ce.ko
petal# modinfo rtw_8821ce.ko
filename: /usr/src/rtw88_lwfinger/rtw_8821ce.ko
license: Dual BSD/GPL
description: Realtek 802.11ac wireless 8821ce driver
author: Realtek Corporation
srcversion: B84BA04B6691B1F18054301
alias: pci:v000010ECd0000C821sv*sd*bc*sc*i*
alias: pci:v000010ECd0000B821sv*sd*bc*sc*i*
depends: rtw_pci,rtw_8821c
retpoline: Y
name: rtw_8821ce
vermagic: 6.8.0-22-generic SMP preempt mod_unload modversions

So I rebooted into kernel 5.15.0-102 and 'rtw88_8821ce' seems to work as always:

petal# modprobe rtw88_8821ce
petal# dmesg | tail -3
[81954.635875] rtw_8821ce 0000:01:00.0: sta 22:b0:01:a8:1e:4b with macid 0 left
[81954.736381] rtw_8821ce 0000:01:00.0: stop vif 60:e9:aa:a7:9d:31 on port 0
[81984.525318] rtw_8821ce 0000:01:00.0: Firmware version 24.11.0, H2C version 12

I tried to use '--force-vermagic' and '--force-modversion' to see what would happen and 'modprobe' failed in both cases.

My guess is that there is something quite weird going on with 'linux-modules-extra-6.8.0-22-generic' because compiling from source an out-of-kernel module should not have any such issues.

[Peter Grandi (pg-8)]

So there are news after yet another reboot after several hundred package updates, but not of the kernel (AFAIK).

Both 'modprobe rtw88_8821ce' (the "official" modules) and 'modprobe rtw_8821ce' (from 'rtw88_lwfinger') succeed.

I think that the 'kmod' package is the same as before ('kmod_31+20240202-2ubuntu5') so I wonder what else has changed.