I am sponsoring this case for the X11 Engineering Group. I am marking
it as closed approved automatic as it simply tracks the community changes.
This case requests a Minor Release Binding since it once again makes
incompatible changes to API & ABI for Xorg loadable modules, and removes
support for several command line options, which even though declared
with Volatile stability, would have to be carefully considered for a
Micro/Patch release.
-Alan Coopersmith- alan.coopersmith at sun.com
Sun Microsystems, Inc. - X Window System Engineering
Template Version: @(#)sac_nextcase 1.68 02/23/09 SMI
This information is Copyright 2009 Sun Microsystems
1. Introduction
1.1. Project/Component Working Name:
Xorg server 1.7
1.2. Name of Document Author/Supplier:
Author: Alan Coopersmith
1.3 Date of This Document:
14 December, 2009
4. Technical Description
This case updates the Xorg server (and the associated X servers based on
its source base - Xephyr, Xvnc and /usr/bin/Xvfb) from version 1.6 (a
standalone release, between X11R7.4 and X11R7.5, reviewed in PSARC 2009/292)
to version 1.7 (which is part of X11R7.5).
This release adds support for X Input Extension 2.0, including Multi-Pointer
X support, using the protocol changes covered by PSARC 2009/678.
Removed Interfaces
------------------
Xservers built on the Xorg 1.7 code base will no longer support these
command-line flags:
+xkb/-xkb Enable/Disable the XKB extension
-probeonly Causes the server to exit after the device probing stage.
The XKB extension is always enabled now, and may not be disabled.
(The Solaris Xorg delivery had a long-standing bug in which keymaps were
not loaded properly without XKB, resulting in unusable keyboards, thus
we don't expect any users are running Xorg with XKB disabled.)
Loadable Module Interfaces:
---------------------------
This release includes incompatible changes in several of the Xorg loadable
module API/ABI's. The version numbers of the ABI's have had their major
number incremented to reflect this, and modules reporting they require a
different version number will not be loaded unless the -ignoreABI option is
used. (Modules can also check ABI versions themselves, and choose which
function variant to call or structure variant to access, based on the reported
versions - this is the option used by nvidia's closed source driver for
instance.)
ABI versions in this release, compared to the previously shipped Xorg 1.6:
ABI Name: 1.6: 1.7:
ABI_ANSIC_VERSION 0.4 0.4
ABI_VIDEODRV_VERSION 5.0 6.0
ABI_XINPUT_VERSION 4.0 7.0
ABI_EXTENSION_VERSION 2.0 2.0
ABI_FONT_VERSION 0.6 0.6
(Major number increments represent incompatible change, minor number
increments represent compatible additions. ABI numbers may increment
multiple times during Xorg server minor version development cycles, to
track changes for those following the head of the development stream.)
The changes that resulted in these version number bumps include:
- Changes needed to support X Input extension 2.0 (XI2), including:
- Addition of labels to input device buttons & valuators.
- Increase of input deviceids from 8-bit to 16-bit ints.
- Removal of old DRI2 buffer alloc/free interfaces for video drivers
- Removal of the old Resources/RAC API for video drivers
All modules built & delivered in the X consolidation have been updated to
adjust to these changes, including all of the community-developed drivers
and extensions, and the Sun created/maintained IA (Interactive Priority
Class) and xtsol (Trusted Extensions) loadable modules.
The drivers delivered through the SPARC graphics consolidation have been
updated for delivery in coordination with the Xorg 1.7 delivery.
Nvidia tracks the open source community ABI changes for their Xorg driver
for all supported platforms (Solaris, Linux & BSD), and the version integrated
into Nevada and OpenSolaris already supports the Xorg 1.7 release ABI's.
VirtualBox's guest addition drivers will need updates for this, as they
do for the BSD & Linux distros which have already or are also working on
adopting Xorg 1.7. VirtualBox typically delivers these drivers via updates
to their application - until those updates are delivered, VirtualBox users
may use the default mouse and Vesa drivers, though with reduced performance
and functionality over VirtualBox guest drivers.
We are not aware of any other consumers of these Volatile ABI's which would
need to be updated in coordination.
Input drivers removed:
----------------------
The incompatible changes to input driver API & ABI required updates to most
input drivers. Since a number of drivers for old input devices were
unmaintained, and had not had any reports of usage in several years, the
community chose to discontinue those drivers instead of porting to the
new API. (The driver sources remain available upstream should anyone
with sufficient interest in such hardware wish to complete the port and
revive it.)
These input drivers are thus no longer provided with Xorg and are removed
from this release:
xf86-input-citron
xf86-input-elographics
xf86-input-fpit
xf86-input-hyperpen
xf86-input-mutouch
xf86-input-penmount
Input driver added:
-------------------
The X.Org community last year got agreement from all the copyright holders
of the Synaptics touchpad driver to relicense it under the MIT License, so
it is now provided by X.Org as xf86-input-synaptics, and is now added to our
packages as well.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Imported Interfaces:
--------------------
Xorg server 1.6 <various> PSARC 2009/292
Xinput extension 2.0 Committed PSARC 2009/678
Exported Interfaces:
--------------------
Interfaces listed under "Removed Interfaces" Removed
Removed input drivers Removed
New Xorg module ABI's listed above Volatile
xf86-input-synaptics Volatile [1]
Materials provided in case directory:
[1] synaptics(7) man page
6. Resources and Schedule
6.4. Steering Committee requested information
6.4.1. Consolidation C-team Name:
X Consolidation / Desktop C-Team
6.5. ARC review type: Automatic
6.6. ARC Exposure: open
