Rust-Written Apple DRM Linux Kernel Driver Renders First Cube

[akira128]

>writing something accidental into some registers or getting it into a weird state could permanently brick it.

Where did you come across that piece of information....or is that just wild speculation?
AFAIK, no one has managed to brick these devices yet, but please share any information you have on this topic.
Hector wrote about that here: https://github.com/AsahiLinux/asahi-...ent-1089129604

[Developer12]

As usual, a colossal detail has been left out of the article:

The m1n1-based python driver didn't JUST render a triangle. It was at the point of 90%+ opengl conformance.

Here it is rendering Lina herself in inochi2d:
https://twitter.com/LinaAsahi/status...28477352615936

This is what the rust driver is replicating, and why they're confident opengl will be working by the end of the year.

[mxan]

I'm very curious to see how an unfinished and ever changing programming language like Rust will work in an operating system.

Literally all programming languages are "unfinished and unchanging", even plain old C. Projects pick one version of the language and stick with it for a long time - like the Linux kernel, which only just recently started accepting C11 code, whereas previously it was based on ANSI C from 1989.

[mxan]

writing something accidental into some registers or getting it into a weird state could permanently brick it.

It's just about impossible to brick Apple Silicon computers - they have the same "DFU mode" that iOS devices have, baked right into the BootROM which cannot be overwritten, so you can just hook it up to another Mac with USB-C and run Apple Configurator to restore it.

[Dukenukemx]

Incredible progress by what is mostly a one-(wo-)man show.
Without Hector we might have never gotten Linux on Apple silicon but it's great we have it and I *might* consider buying a laptop from Apple in the future because the battery life combined with performance is just unmatched.

It has yet to be seen how OpenGL 2.1 will even perform on Apple Silicon before the end of the year. Having a single person working on this isn't going to get anywhere near the results of other OpenGL drivers on Linux. Without Apple spending money and helping out, this isn't going to be usable for many years. Even then, only usable on M1/M2, because by the time this is usable on the M1/M2, we'll be on the M4 or M5 with enough changes to graphics that it'll take more years to get them working 100%.

[Dukenukemx]

for the performance you get they are not expensive. They are rather cheap actually. Also.. hardware isn't that easy to brick anymore.

Only an Apple user would think something over $1k is cheap. There are plenty of laptops that get nearly the same performance for a much cheaper price.

[karolherbst]

Only an Apple user would think something over $1k is cheap. There are plenty of laptops that get nearly the same performance for a much cheaper price.

they don't

[Developer12]

It has yet to be seen how OpenGL 2.1 will even perform on Apple Silicon before the end of the year. Having a single person working on this isn't going to get anywhere near the results of other OpenGL drivers on Linux. Without Apple spending money and helping out, this isn't going to be usable for many years. Even then, only usable on M1/M2, because by the time this is usable on the M1/M2, we'll be on the M4 or M5 with enough changes to graphics that it'll take more years to get them working 100%.

People have made many claims like yours about this project and time and time again have been proven wrong.

[Developer12]

As usual, a colossal detail has been left out of the article:

The m1n1-based python driver didn't JUST render a triangle. It was at the point of 90%+ opengl conformance.

Here it is rendering Lina herself in inochi2d:
https://twitter.com/LinaAsahi/status...28477352615936

This is what the rust driver is replicating, and why they're confident opengl will be working by the end of the year.

This just in, wednesday's stream will involve debugging why KDE doesn't start when using the rust driver:
https://twitter.com/LinaAsahi/status...59320244342785

[Dukenukemx]

People have made many claims like yours about this project and time and time again have been proven wrong.

If people made many claims then those people seem to be correct. The first M1 Mac was released in November 2020, which is nearly 2 years ago. Since then there's barely a functioning distro of Linux for them. 2 years into this and you celebrate a spinning cube. I guarantee you that once OpenGL 2.1 is "finished" you'll probably run Quake or Doom3 at horrible buggy frames per second. There's nothing wrong holding Apple accountable for not doing anything to help out. There's a lot of minor stuff Apple could do that would help move the project a lot faster.