ABI Changes (was Re: Graphics Driver Frameworks and Security)

[Felix Kühling]

Am Mittwoch, den 17.05.2006, 10:14 -0700 schrieb Andy Ritger:
[snip]
> On Wed, 17 May 2006, Felix Kühling wrote:
> 
> > Isn't it too late for this? The ABI has changed and the ABI major
> > version was bumped already due to other changes. You will need separate
> > driver binaries for Xorg 7.0 and Xorg 7.1. So what's the benefit of
> > partially restoring the old ABI at this point?
> 
> The benefit, from my perspective, is the difference in the type of
> ABI changes.  Without the DrawableRec change, a single driver binary
> might be able to run on both 7.0 and 7.1: at run time, you can
> detect the ABI version and do things like cast a GlyphPtr to the
> right type for the right ABI.  Since the amount of code a driver
> typically needs for managing Glyphs is relatively small, this is
> managable.  The same is true for the XV proc (plug in a different
> proc based on the ABI version).  We've done minor things like this in
> the past; e.g., as new xf86 layer functions are exported to drivers.

I understand. But there is still the bumped ABI version number that
prevents a binary driver built for the older ABI from being loaded.
AFAICT the driver is rejected before it even gets a chance to run and
possibly fix up its version number or do other tricks to adjust to the
new ABI. Am I missing something?

Regards,
  Felix

> 
[snip]

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| Felix Kühling <fxkuehl at gmx.de>                     http://fxk.de.vu |
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