On Fri, 1 Feb 2002, Gareth Hughes wrote:
> > I can't believe I am hearing this. The major benifit of free software is
> > that if there is a new and better design you can try it out and then
> > everyone can upgrade. It's not as if we are charging them money they way
> > Microsoft does.
> >
> > Are you saying that progress stops with the inclusion of the driver into
> > the kernel tree ? Could it be that you misunderstood Linus and he meant:
> > during stable series ?
>
> No, there was no misunderstanding. You can't update the DRM code in
> the kernel in such a way that it breaks older versions of the 2D and
> 3D drivers. Simple as that.
Why do I get a feeling that Linus tried to install X several hours in a
row and did not like the experience ? ;)
I do not believe it is a question of "can't": compatibility will be
broken, even if the code is included, at least for the reason that the
combination "old X", new DRM driver will not be well tested.
>
> > As for understanding the hardware - you can't possibly understand which
> > has not been released yet. Heck, with the state of things that is now,
> > we often don't know details about the hardware that was just released.
>
> That's my point. We didn't know how to program the offsets, hence
> the current situation.
>
Just to be clear, I am in no way implying that someone evil misprogrammed
it. The documentation is misleading and the fact that BIOS programs it
similar to the way you did adds to the confusion. Even knowing that it
was misprogrammed it took quite a while to figure out which "OFFSET"s are
really offsets and not absolute addresses. My only desire is to get it
done right, now that we know how to program it.
Vladimir Dergachev
> -- Gareth
>
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