Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S268060AbUIKAvP (ORCPT ); Fri, 10 Sep 2004 20:51:15 -0400 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S268069AbUIKAvP (ORCPT ); Fri, 10 Sep 2004 20:51:15 -0400 Received: from holly.csn.ul.ie ([136.201.105.4]:45037 "EHLO holly.csn.ul.ie") by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S268060AbUIKAuo (ORCPT ); Fri, 10 Sep 2004 20:50:44 -0400 Date: Sat, 11 Sep 2004 01:50:03 +0100 (IST) From: Dave Airlie X-X-Sender: airlied@skynet To: Alan Cox Cc: Jon Smirl , Felix =?ISO-8859-1?Q?K=FChling?= , DRI Devel , lkml , Linus Torvalds Subject: Re: radeon-pre-2 In-Reply-To: <1094853588.18235.12.camel@localhost.localdomain> Message-ID: References: <9e47339104090919015b5b5a4d@mail.gmail.com> <20040910153135.4310c13a.felix@trabant> <9e47339104091008115b821912@mail.gmail.com> <1094829278.17801.18.camel@localhost.localdomain> <9e4733910409100937126dc0e7@mail.gmail.com> <1094832031.17883.1.camel@localhost.localdomain> <9e47339104091010221f03ec06@mail.gmail.com> <1094835846.17932.11.camel@localhost.localdomain> <9e47339104091011402e8341d0@mail.gmail.com> <1094853588.18235.12.camel@localhost.localdomain> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Content-Length: 1731 Lines: 38 > > We've addressed this before. Zillions of drivers provide multiple > functions to multiple higher level subsystems. They don't all have to > be compiled together to make it work. > > 2D and 3D _are_ to most intents and purposes different functions. They > are as different as IDE CD and IDE disk if not more so. So the IDE-CD driver and IDE-disk drivers both program registers on the IDE controller directly.. oh no the ide driver seems to do that.. this is FUD, a graphics card is a device, singular one device, it requires one device driver, the device driver should provide control over the device and be the only one to program its registers.. it can provide services to who ever wants services, be it a 2D console driver or a 3D client or a 4D super-time-travelling application, I can't write a user space IDE driver and still expect the kernel one to be happy, I can't write a second IDE driver for a chipset for formatting disks and expect the normal kernel driver to stay working with it, why do people think graphics driver are meant to be different.. Alan, I agree with how you want to proceed with this, and keep things stable, but anything short of a single card-specific driver looking after the registers and DMA queueing and locking is going to have deficiencies and the DRM has a better basis than the fb drivers, Dave. -- David Airlie, Software Engineer http://www.skynet.ie/~airlied / airlied at skynet.ie pam_smb / Linux DECstation / Linux VAX / ILUG person - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/