Is it possible to use MadWifi on Android given the proper chipsets?

Question

So, a friend and I were going back and forth about our phones (iPhone vs Android), and somehow landed on the topic of MadWifi. Given the right hardware with root access, could one use MadWifi on their device?

Using my phone as per example:

I have a Sony Xperia Play which uses the Snapdragon chipset. The chipset developer, Qualcom, also owns the Atheros chipset (wifi adapter) which I believe is included with this particular phone. However, due to my difficulties and getting root access, I have no way of testing this theory.

Answer 1

Short answer: As per the documentation, Yes.

Long answer:

• Your Sony Ericsson Xperia X10, uses the Qualcomm Atheros MSM8255 ^{product brief PDF for MSM8255} Snapdragon CPU processor, which in turn uses WLAN 802.11b/g/n.

• As per the MadWifi project page:

  The MadWifi project is …

  ... a team of volunteer developers working on Linux kernel drivers for Wireless LAN devices with Atheros chipsets. We currently provide three drivers, MadWifi, ath5k and ath9k.

  ...ath9k supports all currently available 802.11n chipsets from Atheros...

So, as far as we can read from their documentation, they provide support for all 802.11n chipsets, one of those included with the Qualcomm Atheros Snapdragon WiFi chipset.

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Ps: This is purely based on the specifications, I can't guarantee with 100% certainty since I haven't tested this support.