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For New Developers There Are A Lot Of Ways To Help Nouveau

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  • For New Developers There Are A Lot Of Ways To Help Nouveau

    Phoronix: For New Developers There Are A Lot Of Ways To Help Nouveau

    For developers that may be experienced with advanced C/C++ programming, dealing with graphics drivers is a very different beast, and thus for individuals wanting to get involved there are often lots of questions simply about how to get started...

    Phoronix, Linux Hardware Reviews, Linux hardware benchmarks, Linux server benchmarks, Linux benchmarking, Desktop Linux, Linux performance, Open Source graphics, Linux How To, Ubuntu benchmarks, Ubuntu hardware, Phoronix Test Suite

  • #2
    A bit afraid to try it myself. I only have some high end expensive Nvidia GPU's and I always fear that I would manage to break them when messing with the code...

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    • #3
      Originally posted by Veske View Post
      A bit afraid to try it myself. I only have some high end expensive Nvidia GPU's and I always fear that I would manage to break them when messing with the code...
      You realise that Nvidia are not idiots, the hardware also have FAILSAFES to prevent hard malfunction to the harddrive. If things easily got destroyed then Nvidia's reputation would have gone down.

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      • #4
        nouveau is an absolute abomination. NOT because of lack of advanced functionality or rendering glitches. On numerous video chips, it boots to a black screen. One of the bug reports for a Macbook Pro took five years to fix. And this was a critical one- no video.

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        • #5
          Originally posted by garegin View Post
          nouveau is an absolute abomination. NOT because of lack of advanced functionality or rendering glitches. On numerous video chips, it boots to a black screen. One of the bug reports for a Macbook Pro took five years to fix. And this was a critical one- no video.
          And you know what it took in the end? A developer with the hardware willing to sink the time into resolving the issue. This is how things happen in open-source -- you have a problem, you fix it. I guess the overlap of "people who had the problem" and "people who had any interest in resolving the problem" was nil until Pierre came along. Turned out to be a problem shared with all the NVAA/NVAC IGP's but most of their VBIOSes initialized things so that it was invisible, only the Macbook ones had issues.

          If people want to see nouveau improve, sitting around waiting isn't the thing that'll get it done. Go in and contribute!

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          • #6
            The nouveau developers are doing some of the hardest reverse engineering work on the planet. If you have any idea about programming you would respect what these people are trying to do. The fact that the drivers can even render a 3d cube let alone support OpenGL upto version 4.2 is amazing. Try teaching yourself C and C++, then try making even half the stuff the open source community works on. These people have earnt our respect.

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            • #7
              I'm not complaining about their hard work. Just saying that nouveau is really bad. Given the quality, enterprise distros should use LLVMpipe for nvidia cards and make nouveau optional.

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              • #8
                Originally posted by garegin View Post
                I'm not complaining about their hard work. Just saying that nouveau is really bad. Given the quality, enterprise distros should use LLVMpipe for nvidia cards and make nouveau optional.
                Well, distros are free to do that

                I guess those that does not care to encourage opensource development, can install all proven and WHQL signed blob software by default
                Last edited by dungeon; 05 July 2015, 07:05 PM.

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                • #9
                  I must say, I've always had an immense amount of respect for the Nouveau developers. Working on Intel drivers is challenging already, and I have documentation and a much smaller set of GPUs to support. Reverse engineering it all is definitely a challenge. Huge kudos to everyone who's helping make free software graphics drivers a reality.

                  Graphics driver hacking is really fun and rewarding - if quite challenging - I would definitely encourage more people to get involved. Even building the code and helping track down issues can be a great way to start. I originally started working on Mesa because my game didn't work and I figured "hey, it's open source, maybe I can just fix it". I was soon in way over my head, but I eventually found pieces I could understand and make progress on. Eventually you begin to understand more and more of the system; it just takes time.

                  People are pretty friendly and helpful in the Mesa community too.
                  Free Software Developer .:. Mesa and Xorg
                  Opinions expressed in these forum posts are my own.

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                  • #10
                    Originally posted by imirkin View Post

                    And you know what it took in the end? A developer with the hardware willing to sink the time into resolving the issue. This is how things happen in open-source -- you have a problem, you fix it. I guess the overlap of "people who had the problem" and "people who had any interest in resolving the problem" was nil until Pierre came along. Turned out to be a problem shared with all the NVAA/NVAC IGP's but most of their VBIOSes initialized things so that it was invisible, only the Macbook ones had issues.

                    If people want to see nouveau improve, sitting around waiting isn't the thing that'll get it done. Go in and contribute!
                    You've just gotten a +1 for me. I have a "legacy" card (NV44 to be exact) and despite latest oibaf drivers, there is no joy here (yet).
                    Software rendering is all it can do, and that's because I have to specify nomodeset, otherwise I will get a screen with a beautiful colorful pattern (well, my granny could use that to knit something I'm sure)

                    As most developers (as I assume) use GTX cards, without MY help, the "GPU lockup" issue will probably never be solved for "our" cards.

                    That's why---and that's what my +1 was mainly for---people have to REACT, move their butts and send in stuff, saying "Devs, look, I can't fix that myself but I am willing to supply you any information possible so we can nail the bugger".

                    And ... probably help hundreds or thousands of users in the process. Please think of less-well-off countries as well, where my NV44 might still be sort of SOTA. Yes, even in 2015. Shock 'N horror huh. (Think that they might even use Nokia phones that have real keys, no touchpads. Some of you couldn't stand that one minute, I'm sure. :P)
                    Last edited by andyman; 26 October 2015, 02:17 PM.

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