3.4 - Testing If wacom.(k)o Will Load

Before we install the wacom driver, we need to test that it will load properly. We do this by loading the driver manually. We will also need to be root to do this.

WARNING: there is a small chance that this will bomb your kernel, so we run sync to write all the stale buffers to the disk. People using ext3 have little to worry about, but it's always good to be prepared for the worst. At the very least, save your work.

[root@ayukawa linuxwacom]# sync

From the package's associated kernel directory, we unload any previous modules and load the new one. The following example is from a kernel 2.4.22 system.

For Kernel 2.6.x, replace wacom.o with wacom.ko where it is used. 

Kernel 2.6.11 and 2.6.12 are in src/2.6.11.  Kernels 2.6.15 and 2.6.17 are handled in src/2.6.16.

[root@ayukawa linuxwacom]# cd src/2.4.22
[root@ayukawa 2.4.22]# /sbin/rmmod wacom
[root@ayukawa 2.4.22]# /sbin/insmod ./wacom.o      # for those about to rock, we salute you.

Well, if you did not bomb, then good. And if you did, well, sorry. So far, we have not had any reports of this happening, so please send in yours.

Incidentally, if you run "/sbin/insmod wacom.o" and happen to be in the wrong directory, the old driver reloads, sometimes without warning. I therefore changed this to read "/sbin/insmod ./wacom.o" which seems to prevent this from happening. To be certain, you can check the log file for the correct version number.

[root@ayukawa src]# tail /var/log/messages
Nov 09 20:34:41 ayukawa kernel: usb.c: registered new driver wacom
Nov 09 20:34:41 ayukawa kernel: Reporting max 30480, 31680
Nov 09 20:34:41 ayukawa kernel: wacom.c: Setting tablet report for tablet data
Nov 09 20:34:41 ayukawa kernel: input0: Wacom Intuos2 12x12 on usb2:3.0
Nov 09 20:34:41 ayukawa kernel: wacom.c: $1.43-0.8.4-3 Vojtech Pavlik <vojtech@suse.cz>
Nov 09 20:34:41 ayukawa kernel: wacom.c: USB Wacom Graphire and Wacom Intuos tablet driver

The important detail is the version number. A version number like "1.46" is an original kernel version and not from the linuxwacom package. The correct version should also have the -j#.# or -pc#.# portion as well. This is to help differentiate between the stock kernel driver and those available from the Linux Wacom Project.

If you get errors inserting the module, then you may need to reconfigure and build with module versioning disabled. If it loads without a hitch, move on to the next part.