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SubjectRe: GGI Project Unhappy On Linux
On Fri, 27 Mar 1998, J. S. Connell wrote:

> > good. So I see no reason why would it disappear! Sure, the normal video
> > mode may be graphical, but there are many tasks that can be done in text
> > mode just fine.
>
> Why? When's the last time you saw your typical Winbloze user using a
> text-mode window? Heck, in my experience most of them don't even know how
> to *start* a DOS prompt, never mind make it full-screen in text mode!
> *That* is why the text mode is disappearing. Also look at the MediaGX
> chip, etc.
I doubt your typical winblowz user will ever switch to Linux. What must be
done to persuade him to do it? Linux must look like Win95 so that he feels
comfortable, right? Well, if that's the direction Linux is going... Your
typical windows user when put in front of the machine running Linux + X + KDE
wouldn't know HOW to use the KDE desktop (I've seen it - "but there should be
a small picture here..."). I've even seen one guy that was really scared when
he saw the virtual desktop scrolling... I just don't agree that ALL vendors
and hardware manufacturers are looking only at Windows - as long as there is
other hardware platforms using PCI devices the market will provide hardware
that can run on something else than Micro$loth Winblows. I don't see the VAR
systems using WinModems or Windows video accelerators...

> > Eh? It uses the same hardware what gfx mode.
>
> You really *don't* know anything about PC video hardware, do you?
Whatever you say. I would probably called a fool if I said that the floating
point operations, memory management and code execution are done by one and the
same hardware? You'd say that FPU, MMU and PU are NOT the same hardware. And
I'd say they are - the CPU is an integrated conglomerate of all these (and of
course more) components acting as ONE piece of hardware performing different
tasks. If you show me how to take out MMU out of a processor and install it
standalone, then I'll rest my case. The same, imho, is with the average video
hardware - you've got one highly integrated chip that does all of the job.
That's what I meant by "it's the same hardware". It's different circuits
integrated in one chip.

> > Huh? When setting a mode the card doesn't give a damn about what the current
> > video mode is! It simply fills the registers with pre-set values in the
> > given order. Perhaps you were talking about software?
>
> As Alan Cox has stated, and as I know from personal experience[1]: you can
> go from a known video state to a known video state, and you can go from a
> known video state to an unknown (i.e., garbage) video state. You cannot,
Yes, but Alan has also said it's when you set a *valid* mode bypassing BIOS
and then set a different mode using BIOS. Is it a hardware problem? I guess
not, because if you use ONLY BIOS or ONLY your own driver to perform the task,
you'll be fine, right?

> short of resetting the card (which typically takes a reboot), go from an
> unknown state to a known state. It simply doesn't work that way. Why?
And how do you enter the unknown state? By messing up the registers either "by
hand" or by using BIOS and some other driver.

> Because the people who designed the VGA video hardware were idiots (IMHO).
> That's why kernel-arbitrated video mode changing is needed, and that's what
> KGI is. As Varg pointed out so eloquently, KGI is a leetle teeny tiny
> piece of GGI that needs to be in the kernel. The rest doesn't.
Hey! That's what I said several mails ago! If you remember I wasn't against
the IDEA of GGI/KGI but simply against people behind the project and the size
of the project! I merely suggested something more basic than GGI/KGI a simpler
interface to the video hardware. And it was only a suggestion. I know there's
not even a piece of my code in the Linux kernel, but if I'm disturbing or
offending anyone with what I write - just say so and I'll shut up.

best wishes, marek
---
Arguments are extremely vulgar, for everyone in good society holds exactly
the same opinion
Oscar Wilde


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