Using HAL for X Server Config Properties?

[Daniel Stone]

On Fri, Oct 07, 2005 at 10:56:17AM -0400, David Zeuthen wrote:
> I'm not sure it's really a good idea to involve HAL in the X.org server
> configuration process. I remember talking to krh and ajax about X and
> dynamic reconfiguration at the DDC a few months ago. The thinking was
> somewhat like this
> 
>  1. The X server starts up without configuring any hardware. It listens
>     on an IPC interface that is not the X protocol (it makes sense to
>     use a secure system message bus here, e.g. D-BUS) [1]
> 
>  2. When your display manager (e.g. gdm) and desktop session (e.g.
>     GNOME) starts it looks for X servers that are not yet configured
> 
>  3. A suitable unconfigured X server is configured. The settings (e.g.
>     resolution, color depth, multiple monitors etc.) is read from the
>     users settings (e.g. gconf). After a while the desktop session
>     can connect to the X server through the X protocol
> 
>  4. For on-the-fly reconfiguration the desktop session can connect
>     to the IPC D-BUS interface and reconfigure the X server.
> 
> The key point here is this: it is paramount that the X server doesn't
> read a system-wide configuration file. Actually, the departure from
> using a configuration file and instead provide an API that enables some
> program running in the desktop session to configure the X server
> provides this. This program might even fall back and try other options.
> 
> So, I think this is the ideal way to go about it. I don't think we want
> to include the HAL project in this :-)

I'm not convinced about HAL.  But I think the salient point is a
configuration server, that clients can reconfigure with sufficient
credentials; users need to be able to change the default resolution if
they should be able to.  It should be flexible enough to both deal with
minimal configurations and also be reconfigurable on demand.

Daniel, distro vendor hat firmly on[0]

[0]: If you don't think configuration sucks, ask me about it some time
     when I have a lot of time and a comfortable seat.  Make sure you
     don't have anything do to for the next couple of hours.
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