While not as exciting as the USB4 support and staging code lightening for these areas managed by Linux's second in command Greg Kroah-Hartman, he also sent out the char/misc updates this week with other hardware support improvements.

The "char/misc" area that basically is a catch-all for driver not belonging to another subsystem has seen its usual wide assortment of changes. For Linux 5.6 there is:

- Code Aurora has upstreamed the Qualcomm QTI SDAM (Shared Direct Access Memory Module) driver, which allows peripherals to access shared memory on QTI PMICs. This new NVMEM driver allows read/write access to the SDAM module's shared memory.

- Also new on the Qualcomm front is supporting the interconnect buses found on Qualcomm MSM8916 platforms. This INTERCONNECT_QCOM_MSM8916 driver allows working Qualcomm network-on-Chip support for the Snapdragon 410.

- Intel SoundWire updates.

- Intel Jasper Point and Comet Point (Comet Lake H) device IDs added to the MEI driver code.

- Various other fixes.

The complete list of changes via this mailing list post.