X Devs Drop NVIDIA Auto-Config Support

[Ex-Cyber]

I'm kind of ambivalent about this. I can understand the stated concerns of the X.org folks as far as they go, but they seem trivial compared to the problems of shipping the nv driver at all.

[StringCheesian]

The X.org developers are right to reject NVIDIA's unscrupulous tactics. When NVIDIA's blob crashes, as it often does, less knowledgeable users will think it's X.org's fault. The X.org developers are just trying to protect themselves and the users from this hassle. If the user has to modify the xorg.conf file and change the driver names by hand, they'll have a clue that they're using an unsupported blob.

Distros can't ship with a binary blob - it violates the GPL. So the only way the blob gets installed is if the user does it. In which case, the user should be well aware and shouldn't need any clues.

The fact is there will always be nVidia blob bugs mistaken for Xorg bugs, no matter how strongly reminded users are that they are using an unsupported blob. Making the blob a bit inconvenient to setup will not change that in the slightest.

[Vadi]

The X.org developers are right to reject NVIDIA's unscrupulous tactics. When NVIDIA's blob crashes, as it often does, less knowledgeable users will think it's X.org's fault. The X.org developers are just trying to protect themselves and the users from this hassle. If the user has to modify the xorg.conf file and change the driver names by hand, they'll have a clue that they're using an unsupported blob.

You have a very clueless and an ignorant view. By forcing users to manually edit configuration files they have no idea about, somehow you think they'll know who to blame when something goes wrong.

You know what? The user will give up and go away, and not bother with all of this at all. Have fun with your drivers then

[SarahKH]

NV trying to forcefeed their stupid driver ... Honestly, this does it for me. I'll buy another NVidia card when pigs fly.

This is also my opinion on Nvidia cards as well. To be fair to them, they were one of the first companies to put out a half-decent driver for their products in Linux.

But what I don't get is the whole "proprietry is evil" rubbish. Freedom to choose the best tool for the job is also important, which is often subjective I admit. Sometimes, Windows *IS* the best choice *YOU*, sometimes a binary blob is the right choice for you. Hell the little EEE I'm using now is running an Atheros card, featuring the binary blob that is the HAL libraries. My big machine runs the Nvidia drivers.

Is the fuss that Nvidia submitted a bad patch and it was rejected or that Nvidia would like Xorg to autodetect if someone has gone out of their way and put the binary blob on their system? Or that Nvidia are not showing any intention of following AMD/ATi, Intel and VIA's lead?

Personally a bad patch is meh. Detecting the binary driver and using it (without breaking the whole of X in the process) would be nice. Not following the lead of others is IMHO silly, but hey they can do what they want on that front.

TBQFH my next laptop will probably have an Intel gfx system in it due to their increased Linux support but that's just me.

[hmmm]

Hell the little EEE I'm using now is running an Atheros card, featuring the binary blob that is the HAL libraries.

was speaking to the deb-eeepc devs today on irc - apparently ath5k with eee support should hit 2.6.27, 2.6.26 contain acpi n uvc merges

[Joe Sixpack]

It also looks like the distro's are getting behind it. Stefan Dirsch from opensuse already replied.

Come on man, it's SUSE. SUSE has always been the most commercial and the most proprietary. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but let's be realistic and consider the source.

They were the first distro to ship Flash, Java, and Adobe, the only one at the time with closed-source configuration tools (YAST2), and the only one of the big boys that didn't offer their OS for free (SUSE was only available for download as a LiveCD until version 9.0 I think)

Again, nothing is wrong with that, as that's what their user base expects them to do. I'm merely stating that SUSE isn't exactly the best supporting argument. They've always been the most commercial and the most "Windows Like" of the majors. Their main focus has always been giving the users what they want at any cost. Hell they'd ship the OS with a virus if they thought it would get them more users.

[Vadi]

Isn't more people on Linux a good thing for you? Better hardware and software support?

[some-guy]

Come on man, it's SUSE. SUSE has always been the most commercial and the most proprietary. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but let's be realistic and consider the source.

They were the first distro to ship Flash, Java, and Adobe, the only one at the time with closed-source configuration tools (YAST2), and the only one of the big boys that didn't offer their OS for free (SUSE was only available for download as a LiveCD until version 9.0 I think)

Again, nothing is wrong with that, as that's what their user base expects them to do. I'm merely stating that SUSE isn't exactly the best supporting argument. They've always been the most commercial and the most "Windows Like" of the majors. Their main focus has always been giving the users what they want at any cost. Hell they'd ship the OS with a virus if they thought it would get them more users.

um, that was all before Novell bought it, now it's completely free (except the trademarks, obviously)

I think this is a good thing, because most distros do manually make a xorg.conf with their own tool, and the faults of the Nvidia driver shouldn't be placed on the X devs.

This situation barely has to do with OSS fanaticism, it's about the X devs getting bug reports and complaints that aren't their fault

[Joe Sixpack]

um, that was all before Novell bought it, now it's completely free (except the trademarks, obviously)

I think this is a good thing, because most distros do manually make a xorg.conf with their own tool, and the faults of the Nvidia driver shouldn't be placed on the X devs.

It was before Novell bought it, but openSUSE 11 still shipped an unofficial version of glibc, GCC 4.3, and KDE 4. I think I may have wandered off a tad, but my point was their philosophy about end user appeal at any cost, and that philosophy still exists. Again, nothing wrong with that at all - I was merely saying that if you had to guess which distro would be in favor of such a patch, SUSE would be the most obvious guess.

This situation barely has to do with OSS fanaticism, it's about the X devs getting bug reports and complaints that aren't their fault

I agree 100%, and I understood that from the beginning. The point a lot of Linux users don't seem to get is it isn't about including a certain feature/extension/plugin/patch, it's about the responsibility of said feature, and the perception of fault from the end user.

[Vadi]

So to avoid bug complaints, they made the end-users life more harder.

Yes, we'll have less end-users, hence less bug reports. GENIUS.