Pull Request Goes In For X's udev Input Handling

A month ago we reported on news regarding the X.Org plans to move away from HAL considering the FreeDesktop.org Hardware Abstraction Layer project is no longer being developed. Since then patches have emerged to support a xorg.conf.d directory for storing some device-specific options and some new xorg.conf configuration options have emerged for filling in some of the gaps previously covered by HAL.

The most recent development in this process to get the X Server no longer using HAL for input hot-plugging and device handling is the pull request submitted this week for the udev input-hotplug branch. This work now uses libudev on Linux for handling input device hot-plugging. Julien Cristau, the developer behind this udev input-hotplug branch, has said "I think this is now ready for prime time." However, when building the X.Org Server with this newest code it still is defaulting to off.

Here is the pull request for this work that should land in X Server 1.8, which is scheduled to be released in March.