HoytDuff wrote:
On Tuesday 01 October 2002 11:56 pm, Scott Lamb scribbled in crayon on a yellow legal pad:My point is that, contrary to Wolfgang's post, you can't compile them yourself. You can compile some linkage code only.
That's how closed-source drivers are done. I don't see that as a problem unless you object to closed-source drivers. If you do, then don't use them.Wolfgang Gill wrote:Why don't you download there SRC's and compile them yourself. Then there's no need to wait for the 8.0 ready versions. I'll be doing that as soon as my 8.0 boxset arrives. :-)The problem is that the .src.rpms do not contain the complete source code. There's a large chunk of binary code in there.
The problem lots of people had with (null) was that they were linking a gcc2-compiled driver into a gcc3-compiled kernel. It didn't work out very well. RedHat's insmod had a patch to warn people that there were known problems with mixing kernel code compiled with different gccs - apparently the Linux kernel has a different ABI for older versions of gcc for bug workarounds. Some people reported forcing it to load was successful. The better approach was (IMNSHO) to use the compat-gcc to have both kernel and drivers be gcc2, since the source is not available to fully recompile the driver with gcc3.
nVidia's most recent drivers apparently can be loaded with either without RedHat's mixed symbols message. But I don't know if they just something substantial or just removing the "gcc2_compiled" symbols (or whatever they actually are). So I think I'll play it safe and continue to use a gcc2-compiled kernel, despite the success reports I see here.
Scott
