Driver does not work after kernel update

[paoloperrone]

It seems that every time I update the kernel, the driver does not work anymore, and needs to be reinstalled.
Anybody can reproduce?

[jlam55555]

You're correct, this driver is a LKM that must be recompiled with a kernel update-- it's not compiled into the kernel.

If you want to have it (or any other LKM) automatically update on a kernel update, you can use something like DKMS. Unfortunately, I haven't implemented this (yet), but if you're on Arch you can use this AUR package built by @artixnous. (Even if you are not on archlinux, you can view the PKGBUILD and dkms.conf for that package to get an idea of how to do that.)

Edit: found a quote, from Linux Device Drivers, ed. 3 (p. 26):

Bear in mind that your module’s code has to be recompiled for each version of the kernel that it is linked to—at least, in the absence of modversions, not covered here as they are more for distribution makers than developers. Modules are strongly tied to the data structures and function prototypes defined in a particular kernel version; the interface seen by a module can change significantly from one kernel version to the next.