Questions[contributing](ubuntu)

I have a somewhat uncommon USB WiFi device (in my case, a Hawking HWDN1), which, after doing the following, works with the rt2800usb driver already in the kernel:

sudo modprobe rt2800usb
sudo bash -c "echo 0e66 0004 > /sys/bus/usb/drivers/rt2800/new_id"

I'm manually loading the driver (modprobe), and then "binding" it to the device, i.e. telling it that it does indeed support that particular device (by the device id)

Unfortunately, this doesn't stick beyond a reboot. Is there a neat way (i.e. perhaps with a way other than just running a script on boot) to make it permanent?

Or, even better, how would I go about submitting the USB device ID to the maintainers of the rt2800usb driver, so that it "just works" for everyone with the same device? A quick look through the driver source, confirms that my device is not in the device table (towards the middle of the file), however very simar ones (similar device id) are there - so that seems to suggest that I could just add the device id and it would "just work" for everyone - but I'm not sure.

How do you contribute Funds to the Lubuntu project? I only want to make a small contribution to it. And I have is installed on a old computer.

This question is similar to this one: What unique features has Ubuntu brought to the Linux community? but in this case it is directed towards what has Ubuntu contributed to the official Linux Kernel.

Many times I have heared about Intel contributing patches to the Linux Kernel like the RC6 latest patches and many more related to recent support for Sandy/Ivy Bridge. In another group, Android did an upstream patch and a lot of ARM patches have also come to the Linux Kernel.

I have seeing a small percent of companies and groups that have contributed to the Linux Kernel (http://kernel.org) but what I want to know is, since the beginning of Ubuntu till now, what has Ubuntu contributed to the Linux Kernel in regards to any aspect of the kernel.

For Kernel information I typically go to http://kernelnewbies.org and http://kernel.org

I have basic C and C++ programming skills as well as a little bit experience with gtkmm and Linux-programming in general (not to forget I have lots of spare time). I want to participate in an Ubuntu project which is small and not too complex in order to improve my programming sills and of course support Ubuntu.

Can you give me pointers in the right direction and do you know of a project where I could start?

I'm looking for some guidance on how to keep track of the contributions I make to the project so I can present them as evidence when I eventually apply for Ubuntu membership. When I was listening to Jono Bacon's weekly Q&A on Ustream earlier tonight, a question was asked about what was meant by a 'sizeable and sustained contribution' to the project, with respect to an Ubuntu membership application, he said that it consisted of a prolonged period of regular contributions which were logged in a wiki. Is this the Ubuntu wiki, or is that just reserved for high level projects? Also some advice on what's worth recording (every single bug report?) would also help. Thanks.