I have a FC5 distribution going: 2.6.16-1.2080_FC5.

I read that the madwifi drivers offer a software access to the card physical layer by a software in the driver named HAL (hardware abstraction layer). The first HAL came in binary format so that is harder for users to have access to the layer.
My question is if there is a version of HAL running for linux distributions as mine? Has anyone tested HAL with 2.6.16 kernel?

My future goal is accessing the mac layer and modifying values such as the contention window (backoff),the CCA(clear channel assessment),ACKs,RTS/CTS...

If anyone is familiarised with the above subject would be appreciated if he/she would post a comment.

Discussion on the matter is very important because having access to the HAL is like telling our card to perform in any way we want!

Quite simply, you will not be able to get access to the HAL due to federal regulations that limit the cards' capabilities. The HAL itself does not depend on the kernel, it is wrapped into a module by some glue code.
Why don't you subscribe to the madwifi-devel mailing list at http://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/l.../madwifi-devel ?

Eric