Kernel support for graphics cards

[Carsten Haitzler (The Rasterman)]

On Sun, 08 Jan 2006 21:23:23 +1100 Bojan Smojver <bojan at rexursive.com> babbled:

> I read Keith's excellent paper "The (Re)Architecture of the X Window
> System" (http://keithp.com/~keithp/talks/xarch_ols2004/xarch-ols2004-html/)
> and was encouraged by the direction that X is finally taking - the one of
> rapid and modern development.
> 
> I do have a few questions in relation to kernel support for graphics
> cards though. Is hardware support for graphics cards in X going to be
> marked deprecated in the near future (i.e. in favour of complete
> Linux/*BSD/Solaris/<insert_flavour_here> kernel support)? If yes, will
> it be accompanied by the dual release of X (i.e. one source tree with
> deprecated hardware drivers, one with "hands-off" hardware), like we've
> seen in the case of modularisation? And finally, is there a page on
> freedesktop.org wiki that deals with the transition (specs for kernel
> folks, status of kernel drivers, roadmap etc.)?
> 
> PS. What prompted me to ask this is the following sentence from the
> paper: "All of these systems directly manipulate hardware registers
> without any coordination among them." That really scares me - it almost
> sounds like the mess that DOS used to be...

quick answer: no.  kernels are not going to have graphics drivers any time soon
- if ever. :)

-- 
------------- Codito, ergo sum - "I code, therefore I am" --------------
The Rasterman (Carsten Haitzler)    raster at rasterman.com
裸好多
Tokyo, Japan (東京 日本)