Which package typically includes network controller drivers

[Connor Kuehl]

On 11/15/19 1:18 PM, Jeffrey Walton wrote:
> Hi Everyone,
> 
> My apologies if this one is off-topic.
> 
> I recently encountered a bad apt update using Ubuntu. The 5.0.0-36
> kernel was installed, but it was missing network card drivers. I tried
> to modprobe the network card drivers but they were missing.
> 
> I was able to recover by standing up a VM, copying the *.deb files
> from /var/cache/apt/archive, sneaker netting to the wounded machine,
> and then manually re-installing the packages.
> 
> My question is, which package typically includes the network card
> drivers? I believe the choices are
> linux-modules or linux-modules-extras.

Hi Jeffrey,

The best course of action here would be to file a bug on Ubuntu's bug 
tracker: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux

Your instinct is correct though. The most common modules that aren't 
built-in to the kernel (i.e., compiled as CONFIG_BLAH=y) are in the 
linux-modules package. There's a good chance your driver (should be) in 
there. The linux-modules-extras are basically "everything else".

Please do file a bug on launchpad as I do think distro-related support 
is a little off-topic for this mailing list.

- Connor