Re: [Linux-fbdev-devel] Future of Framebuffer

[Paul M. <le...@Ch...>]

On Thu, Oct 04, 2001 at 03:33:18PM -0400, Chris Wright wrote:
> This is somewhat ironic, but a friend of mine and myself have been
> recently pondering vast extentions into the /dev/fb device.
> Basically, we see it as a great device already.  (a simple pointer to
> screen memory is all a graphics programmer ever wants).  however, most new
> hardware usually supports some form of 2d and 3d acceleration.
> unfortunately, these are seldom/never used in linux unless you have a card
> that is supported, and then, only if you use X, which defeats the purpose
> of /dev/fb.   we are proposing that a standard suite of ioctl's get added
> to aid in acceleration.  of course, the basic driver would be a simple
> vesafb driver plus software accelerations.  as cards are added, and
> drivers are ported, they could be used in the software's place.  This
> would make the hardware usable by anything, not just stuff in X, which
> seems like a Good Thing to me :^)
> 
Ick. Adding ioctl()'s shouldn't even be considered. Instead of _adding_ more,
it really would be a lot cleaner to just gut them entirely and move to a
real namespace system (gfxfs anyone?).. then you can have your direct pointer
to video memory, colormap, and so on, and so forth..

Getting fb to interoperate with the DRM code (and vice versa *cough* MTRR
handling *end cough*) would clean a lot of that sort of stuff.. especially
with things like DMA resource management. Would certainly make X happier.

Regards,

-- 
Paul Mundt <le...@ch...>