DragonFlyBSD Pulls In The Radeon Driver Code From Linux 4.4

[phoronix]

Phoronix: DragonFlyBSD Pulls In The Radeon Driver Code From Linux 4.4

While the Linux 4.4 kernel is quite old (January 2016), DragonFlyBSD has now re-based its AMD Radeon kernel graphics driver against that release. It is at least a big improvement compared to its Radeon code having been derived previously from Linux 3.19...

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=DragonFlyBSD-Radeon-4.4-Code

[Nille]

Why do they rebase to such and ancient version?

[FireBurn]

Why do they rebase to such and ancient version?

Was just about to ask the same thing - thought they would have wanted to hit the latest LTS at the very least

[Michael]

Why do they rebase to such and ancient version?

They incrementally move forward. Simply pulling in the latest Linux Git would be a huge effort due to larger code-base and a lot more DRM interfaces to deal with. They used to stay only a number of releases behind upstream in Linux 3.x days but now is quite a ways behind so if they are to maintain that existing support they just need to keep moving forward incrementally.

[skeevy420]

I've always wished the AMD open source team would work with some BSD out there. Nvidia has BSD and Solaris drivers and it would be smart for AMD to have at least BSD drivers for companies that use Nvidia+BSD for their computing purposes.

Or if Sony would contribute back. The PS4 has one hell of an AMD BSD driver and shows that BSD has real gaming capability when shown some TLC. Steam could probably be able to do something with BSD if it was on par with Linux.

[GI_Jack]

I've always wished the AMD open source team would work with some BSD out there. Nvidia has BSD and Solaris drivers and it would be smart for AMD to have at least BSD drivers for companies that use Nvidia+BSD for their computing purposes.

Or if Sony would contribute back. The PS4 has one hell of an AMD BSD driver and shows that BSD has real gaming capability when shown some TLC. Steam could probably be able to do something with BSD if it was on par with Linux.

How is that BSD license working out for ya?

Let me drop a really hard one on people: GPL is the better license for business.

Rationale: It mitigates tragedy of commons.

[BwackNinja]

How is that BSD license working out for ya?

Let me drop a really hard one on people: GPL is the better license for business.

Rationale: It mitigates tragedy of commons.

Hate to break it to you, but AMD's code in the Linux kernel is MIT licensed, not GPL. That's why DragonflyBSD (and others) can even do the work they are doing porting the drivers over rather than trying to rewrite them entirely. Here's an example:

https://github.com/torvalds/linux/blob/6f0d349d922ba44e4348a17a78ea51b7135965b1/drivers/gpu/drm/amd/amdgpu/amdgpu.h

[Guest]

Hate to break it to you, but AMD's code in the Linux kernel is MIT licensed, not GPL. That's why DragonflyBSD (and others) can even do the work they are doing porting the drivers over rather than trying to rewrite them entirely. Here's an example:

https://github.com/torvalds/linux/bl...mdgpu/amdgpu.h

I don't think you understand this. Sony can get away with keeping their drivers for themselves, because the BSD-style license doesn't force them to release it. This is not about the drivers in Linux.

[brad0]

I've always wished the AMD open source team would work with some BSD out there. Nvidia has BSD and Solaris drivers and it would be smart for AMD to have at least BSD drivers for companies that use Nvidia+BSD for their computing purposes.

Other than a few stupid idiots no one wants it. Especially so for the NVIDIA garbage.

[brad0]

How is that BSD license working out for ya?

Let me drop a really hard one on people: GPL is the better license for business.

Rationale: It mitigates tragedy of commons.

This is the dumbest comment I've seen in quite awhile. One idiot responding to another idiot.