ZN writes: > Another thing occurs to me, given the recent discussions on game toolkits. > The PE used to handle programs in mode 8 and 4 so that all windows of the > same mode would be displayed together. When the cursor would get over an > area used by a burried window that is in a mode different than the current > mode of the screen, the cursor would show 4 or 8. If that window was > picked, the mode was changed and all the windows using a different mode > removed. > I wonder if this concept is still used, or indeed, if it could be expanded. > In particular, give programs the ability to declare a 'user' mode. The > point would be to use this for programs that need control of the screen > hardware but do not necessairly use the drivers. The standard mode change, > screen clear and restore behaviour would be used to prevent such a > 'hardware direct' program from corrupting the display by writing out of > turn, and other programs from getting to run with the wrong mode selected. > A program that would declare user mode would in fact also declare which > hardware mode it is using, but the 'user' flag would insure that it gets > exclusive use of the display when picked (as if it implied a guardian > window the size of the whole screen), no matter if other programs may be > using a compatible hardware mode and could in theory be displayed as > burried windows. Along with handling games, this would enable programs to > support hardware modes that are not yet supported in the screen driver.
Why not just use iow.xtop? It simply works as a referee. You can still write to the screen any way you please. Per
