#3551 Issue open: Automatically include firmware files for the kernel modules in the recovery system¶

Labels: enhancement, severe improvement

jsmeix opened issue at 2026-01-09 13:41:¶

By luck
(while following links starting at https://github.com/rear/rear/issues/3550)
I noticed
https://github.com/rear/rear/issues/3270#issuecomment-2222981059
which is dated July 2024
which makes my current knowledge outdated that it is
in practice impossible to find out what firmware files
get used on one's own hardware, cf. my
https://github.com/rear/rear/issues/2681#issuecomment-930879162
which is dated September 2021.

https://github.com/rear/rear/issues/3270#issuecomment-2222981059
reads (excerpt)

the dependency goes like this: kernel -> modules -> firmware.

So you would need to know the modules that your hardware requires
and then you can check with those modules for required firmware.
We could, TBH, actually determine this automatically because
modinfo reports the potential firmware files used ba a module.

For example
on my openSUSE Leap 15.6 workstation with AMD graphics
(built-in in CPU "Ryzen 3 4300G with Radeon Graphics")
I get:

# lsmod

Module                  Size  Used by
...
amdgpu              13389824  19
...


# modinfo -F firmware amdgpu

amdgpu/cyan_skillfish_gpu_info.bin
amdgpu/navi12_gpu_info.bin
amdgpu/arcturus_gpu_info.bin
...


# for f in $( modinfo -F firmware amdgpu ) ; \
  do find /lib/firmware/ \
     | grep "$f" || echo "FAILED to find $f in /lib/firmware/" ; \
  done

FAILED to find amdgpu/cyan_skillfish_gpu_info.bin in /lib/firmware/
/lib/firmware/amdgpu/navi12_gpu_info.bin.xz
/lib/firmware/amdgpu/arcturus_gpu_info.bin.xz
...

So it is normal that some firmware files
which are listed by modinfo
may not exist on the system.

When FIRMWARE_FILES is neither 'yes' nor 'no'
we should automatically determine available firmware files
for the kernel modules which are in the recovery system and
add those firmware files automatically to the recovery system.

jsmeix commented at 2026-01-09 13:52:¶

Personally I consider this as a severe improvement in ReaR
because the old problem that it was in practice impossible
to find out what firmware files match on one's own hardware
was really an annoyance for our users who use ReaR on
real hardware.

I will work on it as soon as possible and
as far as possible i.e. as far as time permits.

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[Export of Github issue for rear/rear.]