Vivian, On Thursday, December 29, 2011 17:36:24 Vivian Meazza wrote: > I don't fully understand the point - we're not using .dds, and fancy shaders > as the default option - what else isn't working with open source drivers?
Well, the default f16 does not work anymore for example. I have also never tried the new textures, but I assume that these also contain precompressed data? Also you claimed that the old texture files start to bitrot comared to the new ones which makes me think that the new standard should be the dds files. This together makes me think that the dds files should replace the traditional image files. > FlightGear should be working just as it always was. Those unable or > unwilling to use closed source or fully compliant drivers just don't get to > see some of the fancier eye-candy, but that should be all. Well, the drivers are fully compiant. And if compliance would be a problem I would rather improove the driver than raise this at an application level. These kind of precompressed images limits their usage to a specific set of drivers. And no, due to the patent issues no open source code including ours is allowed to implement compression/decompression code for these image formats. Even if this is easy implementation wise. > > So, I think the mipmap generation hangs with the nvidia drivers are a > > serious > > problem. But just limiting everything to the use of exactly this driver > > where > > this problem is worst cannot be a valid answer. > > I haven't see such a problem - now I will look for it. Ok, for that you might need to understand that the reason for Erik to use the dds files for the f16 is that they appear to improove the hangs that occur with ati and nvidias drivers on mipmap computation. Which means either use the f16 together with the closed source stuff or don't use the f16. This is as of today *practically mutually exclusive*. > > I would like to have a flightgear that is by default just running on > > every average system. Having this run faster on a special configured > > system with some > > better configuration options and hand tuned hardware and drivers is very > > fine. > > But without tuning it must at least work in an acceptable way. > > It should - and I thought it did - I see no problems here with shaders off > and using the default materials.dds - where is the problem? As long as all is optional, the 'old stuff' is not bitrotting and as long as the usual model still work, this should not be a huge problem. I already told, I can tolerate not having the f16 - that would be sad, but ok - but if the same happens with the majority of our texture files, I would object. And this is what I try to do now: Object against using these patented compression algorithms. I do not care for the on disk format of any image file we have. But the problem is that some kind of precompression that can be stored in these dds files cannot be used with other drivers than the closed ati and nvidia ones. As long as these patented compression techiques are not used, every OpenGL driver can use this and displays this fine. Think: Intel has the hugest marketshare in graphics today. If I remember right, they sell more than ati and nvidia together (*). This kind of change in effect rules out the majority of users as intel cannot work with these files. (*) There are several statistics out there, this is the intel one that counts all sold computers. AMD does usually counts the revenue made with graphics boards (where ati wins I believe) or nvidia that usually limit statistics to professional systems (where nvidia wins). ... or something along the lines - you get the idea. > > I have checked in a change to flightgear to make the use of the > > compressed internal formats a starttime configuration option. > > I am still interrested if we have that hangs also with texture > > compression disabled and without providing precompressed dds textures? > > Yes - good idea - I'm using that now - unfortunately my system was working > just fine before so it might be a little hard to see if there is any effect! > I'm not entirely clear what bug this fix is trying to solve. You do not experience any hangs? What is the motivation for you to use dds files? What do you gain by not using the usual image files? The motivation behind this mentioned change is to sort out the best compromise so that the hangs hopefully disappear - which I hope to get with precomputed mipmaps - and being able to display fine with any driver/gpu. Greetings Mathias ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Ridiculously easy VDI. With Citrix VDI-in-a-Box, you don't need a complex infrastructure or vast IT resources to deliver seamless, secure access to virtual desktops. With this all-in-one solution, easily deploy virtual desktops for less than the cost of PCs and save 60% on VDI infrastructure costs. Try it free! http://p.sf.net/sfu/Citrix-VDIinabox _______________________________________________ Flightgear-devel mailing list Flightgear-devel@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/flightgear-devel
