Memory issue with libcairo/gl and -nvidia binary driver

[Bryce Harrington]

On Thu, Mar 24, 2011 at 01:31:17PM -0500, cat wrote:
> On Wed, Mar 23, 2011 at 6:42 PM, Bryce Harrington <bryce at canonical.com>wrote:
> 
> > In testing, we found an oddball issue that with enabling GL for
> > libcairo, when running under NVIDIA's proprietary driver applications
> > see significantly increased memory utilization.
> >
> >  https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/cairo/+bug/725434
> >
> > For ubuntu we're working around this by having gl and non-gl binary
> > packages in libcairo, so wayland can use the former and everything else
> > the latter.  We will be seeking a more proper fix longer term.
> >
> > I don't think this affects wayland directly, so just take as an FYI.
> >
> > Bryce
> >
> >
> >
> Forgive me if Im wrong but isn't nvidia ignoring the new graphics
> technologies(no plan support for kms)?

That's orthogonal to the issue.  Even though Wayland won't work on
-nvidia, still a lot of users use that driver so if we are to enable GL
globally for libcairo2, then regressions such as the above impact
Wayland's deployability, even though wayland itself is fine.

Fwiw, while I think KMS is pretty sweet, a lot of our users find less
use for that functionality vs. things like Xinerama for >2 head systems,
and for other GL and performance features in -nvidia.

> really I forsee the driver becoming obsolete.

Perhaps some day, but not today.

Bryce