X Input 2.2 Is Merged, But RandR 1.4 Is Still M.I.A.

While the X Input 2.2 / Multi-Touch code was merged into X.Org Server 1.12 today, still missing is RandR 1.4 support as sought after by NVIDIA driver users, among other Linux desktop users.

As expected, X Input 2.2 with multi-touch support was merged into the xserver Git repository today in time for the X.Org Server 1.12 development cycle. Pulling in this new input code effectively marks the end of the merge window for xorg-server 1.12. There may be still a few small merges set to take place this month, but the merge window is basically over for X.Org Server 1.12 that's expected for release in March.

To much dismay, RandR 1.4 hasn't made it for X.Org Server 1.12. RandR 1.4 has been talked about going back to 2009, but it hasn't managed to see the light of day. This latest revision to the X.Org Resize and Rotate extension was originally set to be included in X.Org Server 1.10 and was even living in the Git repository, but RandR 1.4 was pulled at the last minute since developers decided it wasn't ready. This came after the merge window of X.Org Server 1.9 was even extended to try to accommodate RandR 1.4, but that was the first failure of this extension update.

Even after getting pulled from X.Org Server 1.10, it didn't make it back in for 1.11 and now with 1.12 a merge hasn't been attempted either or any new visible work on version 1.4. The last major public discussion about RandR 1.4 was back in March.

RandR 1.4 is supposed to bring several new features including per-CRTC pixmap support and changes to make it easier for NVIDIA's binary Linux graphics driver to more easily support RandR 1.2+ with their driver architecture (see the linked article for more details).

As shown by the Git log for the randr directory, there hasn't been much work at all to this important X.Org Server extension since the various 1.4 patches were reverted in February. As far as what's made it in since September with the 1.12 merge window, there's only a handful of small commits.

There's a few small code changes, support for stopping clients from deleting immutable output properties, a small logic change, changing some print calls, and removing redundant re-declarations of functions in a header file. There isn't any sprite position transforms, per-CRTC pixmaps, or any other new functionality as expected for RandR 1.4. There also isn't NVIDIA's RandR border property patch.

In terms of the libXrandr library, there's only been trailing white-space fixes in the past three months (the libXrandr Git log).

Perhaps we will see RandR 1.4 finally materialize in 2012 with X.Org Server 1.13? Or at least in some near-term release of the X.Org Server before the Wayland Display Server becomes more important? Let's wait and see.