Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

An Update On The OpenGL 3 Support In Mesa

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

  • #31
    Originally posted by RealNC View Post
    The effort (in other words, cost) required to write a binary driver for Linux is higher compared to systems that use a driver ABI. So some vendors won't bother writing one. The quality of the binary drivers of vendors who actually write binary Linux drivers would probably increase if they were offered an ABI.

    Lower cost to support a platform means more support for that platform. You cannot really force vendors to offer source code and docs with Linux, because in order to do so you must be a force to be reckoned with. If sales of vendors are 95% Windows+Mac, then the rest can be ignored.
    What you are looking for already exists. It's called FreeBSD. A stable kernel ABI, great - now where are the drivers?

    In short, your whole argument is bogus.

    Comment


    • #32
      Originally posted by BlackStar View Post
      No, they don't. Proprietary Intel drivers do not support OpenGL 3 (nevermind 4), proprietary Ati R500 / Nvidia 6x00/7x00 drivers do not expose OpenGL 3 features (even though they could) and Apple does not support OpenGL 3 at all. Snap out of it.
      Compare the speed of the Intel binary driver with the open source one. Same for radeon vs fglrx and nuveau vs nvidia.

      Also, prop drivers support GL3 on newer cards for a while now. The open ones don't.

      And btw, "snap out" of what?

      OSS driver support has exploded since Ati released the docs. Just go install a 3-year-old distro and see what I mean.
      Needing 3 years to get usable is not my definition of "exploded." And we're still not there. Speed is slower, power management isn't that good, features are missing.

      Comment


      • #33
        Originally posted by BlackStar View Post
        What you are looking for already exists. It's called FreeBSD. A stable kernel ABI, great - now where are the drivers?

        In short, your whole argument is bogus.
        FreeBSD is something no one uses. Linux at least has its 2 or 3% market share. FreeBSD is like sub-zero market share. Vendors aren't interested at all.

        So how does that make my argument bogus?

        Comment


        • #34
          People are getting stuck on the issue of GPU drivers which are very important, but completely and utterly atypical when it comes to device drivers.

          GPU drivers are insanely complicated because supporting a GPU fully nowadays pretty much means that you have to write a complete operating system kernel (minus filesystems and mouse management, basically).

          For the VAST majority of devices out there, nobody would dream about having binary blobs injected into Linux.

          So it's expected that free drivers would lag behind when it comes to graphics, but it is all the more important that they continue to be developed, because GPUs are so central to modern computers that you simply CANNOT afford to have them all be hidden behind a thick layer of voodoo.

          A recent bug in nvidia drivers was apparently caused by the drivers intercepting kernel system calls in order to fix a GL+thread issue, and ended up breaking non-GL applications.

          Why the holy *^%$ does a GPU driver do this? WHAT does it do exactly?

          Comment


          • #35
            Originally posted by RealNC View Post
            Needing 3 years to get usable is not my definition of "exploded." And we're still not there. Speed is slower, power management isn't that good, features are missing.
            If you consider how complex these drivers are and how few people are working on them, then yes, they exploded. The R300 drivers are fully-featured, including powersaving, suspend, and full OpenGL support. On some hardware, they are even approaching the binary blob performance according to recent benchmarks and developer comments.

            THAT is what Linux needs, not sucking up to binary developers.

            Comment


            • #36
              Originally posted by RealNC View Post
              Compare the speed of the Intel binary driver with the open source one. Same for radeon vs fglrx and nuveau vs nvidia.

              Also, prop drivers support GL3 on newer cards for a while now. The open ones don't.

              And btw, "snap out" of what?
              Proprietary drivers from Intel and Apple still do not support OpenGL 3. Open-source Intel is *ahead* of its closed-source counterpart in extensions - not to mention much more stable. R600 is ahead of Apple's drivers in almost all areas. Even Nouveau runs my GL3-backported-to-GL2 apps almost perfectly (which is much more than can be said for Apple's driver stack).

              Snap out of your trance, obviously.

              FreeBSD is something no one uses. Linux at least has its 2 or 3% market share. FreeBSD is like sub-zero market share. Vendors aren't interested at all.
              Yeah, well, vendors aren't interested in Linux either. Yet we somehow manage to have more plentiful and more robust drivers, despite our lack of a stable kernel ABI.

              You argued that the unstable ABI hurt Linux, remember? If so, where's your evidence?

              Comment


              • #37
                Originally posted by pingufunkybeat View Post
                If you consider how complex these drivers are and how few people are working on them, then yes, they exploded. The R300 drivers are fully-featured, including powersaving, suspend, and full OpenGL support. On some hardware, they are even approaching the binary blob performance according to recent benchmarks and developer comments.

                THAT is what Linux needs, not sucking up to binary developers.
                Well said.

                Comment


                • #38
                  Originally posted by TemplarGR View Post
                  r600c never failed me. It may not play all games or play them fast, but it gives me no headaches on my everyday work, unlike catalyst before it(even on Ubuntu). The few times i wanted to play a game(3 games ME2 Creed 2 Starcraft 2), i installed Win 7(there is a handy 30 day trial period), played(or simply tested) it, and then formated it again. Yeap, that simple. I prefer the hustle of formatting than the hustle of Wine. If there were a few more games i 'd like to play, i would buy a console instead. Gaming on PC makes no significant difference anymore...

                  I would love to not have to do that. I would love the r600c to have a faster implementation plus GL3. But this is just a luxury feature for me. Although i want it, i am not bashing the devs for their efforts, they are doing everything they can and i am happy with their results. I am using their driver and will continue to use it no matter what. When the next games that interest me go out, i will play them on Win 7 again, and i will get back to Linux and radeon driver after that.

                  Instead of bashing and complaining, see if you can help them. A few days back i decided to help them with feedback on their driver. Installed almost all games and apps on this page



                  and updated the matrix with Mesa 7.9 results. It may not be code, but it is something... Everything helps.

                  I have been silently watching Mesa mailing list and studying the code, in order to be able to contribute. Unfortunately i have a lot of work at this time, and soon i will join the army for some months, so my plan to contribute has to wait until next Christmas. But my thoughts so far are that it is not that difficult. It surely is a lot of work, but if most of us who know how to code could contribute just a tiny bit, this driver would be the best in no time. So many of us use Mesa, imagine for a moment if say a thousand users, professional coders or students, would contribute an hour of their time daily to this project. In a few months, it would become much better. It is not hard, it is just that most of us are lazy bastards.

                  So quit bashing and start contributing, anything. Contribute code, contribute testing feedback, contribute documentation, anything. Just help make Linux better!
                  Very well put and even inspiring!

                  I pretty much stopped playing games a few years ago.
                  Nowadays I only need Armagetron Advanced!

                  Fact is if I get hardware video acceleration and working dynpm I will be happy and probably will care even less for GL 3+...

                  Comment


                  • #39
                    Originally posted by RealNC View Post
                    That's pretty much a thing of the past now. Windows grew up and became a real OS. It even allows for restarting or replacing drivers, including GPU ones, while the GUI is running without a restart or logout/login.
                    Can you please show me some proof of it? Video would be good. Should not necessary be AMD->Nvidia, but normal driver upgrade (ie catalyst 10.1->10.2 without reboot and without GDI shutdown).
                    That reminds me of Ksplice.

                    Originally posted by RealNC View Post
                    The effort (in other words, cost) required to write a binary driver for Linux is higher compared to systems that use a driver ABI. So some vendors won't bother writing one. The quality of the binary drivers of vendors who actually write binary Linux drivers would probably increase if they were offered an ABI.

                    Lower cost to support a platform means more support for that platform. You cannot really force vendors to offer source code and docs with Linux, because in order to do so you must be a force to be reckoned with. If sales of vendors are 95% Windows+Mac, then the rest can be ignored.
                    I dont see one thing: How swaping API for ABI is going to make things easier. In first case it is a binary interface, with some bits swaping from time to time according to specs. In the second case, you have funtions swaping from time to time according to changelogs.

                    In my optinion working with IDE and letting code compile is way easier than using assembler and binary alphabet. I mean, unless you're not human, words should do more sense than 1s and 0s.

                    And then, it still stays the code. The difference is either the code is closed (ABI) or not (API), and hence my previous post makes sense. Just look at FGLRX back some years - huge code mess and disorientation, as mentioned by AMD crew. Its better to have opensource, clean, documented code than binary mess by some guy from China(US, Korea, Russia etc) village. I think this is the reason linux is so stable to the point.

                    And I have own special policy with vendors ignoring linux. They ignore linux, I ignore them.

                    Its either you eat SLUM(tm) from crappy pandora box without even ingredients specified and have tons of it, or know exactly what you are eating, even if it is scarcer and not every one agree to sell you this good food.

                    Well, Im care for (linux) health more than for pops.

                    Comment


                    • #40
                      Originally posted by RealNC View Post
                      FreeBSD is something no one uses. Linux at least has its 2 or 3% market share. FreeBSD is like sub-zero market share. Vendors aren't interested at all.

                      So how does that make my argument bogus?
                      Im not offending or flaming you, RealNC. Everyone should have his own opinion, I just express my own.

                      Ladies and gentleman - THE BSD!

                      Comment

                      Working...
                      X