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FromFredrik Sjoholm <>
SubjectRE: More GGI opining
DateThu, 26 Mar 1998 14:04:12 -0500
	It seems to me that this is turning into a GGI versus X debate.
If the idea is to
	replace X with GGI, then i'd be worried, but isn't the whole
idea to create a uniform
	graphics device driver interface, in the kernel ?

	X would be implemented on top of GGI, and all device driver
efforts could be
	concentrated on writing KGI compliant drivers, which would
instantly benefit
	the X server, OpenGL and any other APIs/applications that now
has it's own
	limited set of drivers. SGI uses this approach, with a
/dev/opengl which is used
	by the X server for rendering.

	This way, the network tarnsparency of X (which is very
important) would be unaltered.
	Only the actual X server running on a KGI capable machine would
use the GGI layer
	for physical rendering. View it as a generalized extension of
XAA, that isn't specific to
	the XFree86 server. Somebody wants to write a game or similair
application, use the
	GGI layer, of course this would mean the program has to run on
the local machine,
	but how many of us play quake with an exported X display anyway
?

	The kernel driver should be able to arbitrate access, so X could
still be running while
	running a raw GGI application, and allow switching in a
virtual-console fashion.
	GGI should be great news to everybody working on
re-implementation of other APIs,
	such as Mesa. By nailing the specifications for the kernel GGI
driver down hard, we
	might even be able to get hw vendors to provide drivers (and let
them provide it as .o
	kernel modules if they must). I agree with Linus on the
specifications/goals issue,
	there has to be a very elaborate effort to create flexible specs
that will also cover exotic
	hardware we might see in the future, such as hardware-nurbs or
special purpose
	graphics cpus.

	/Fredrik - Netspeak Corp. 

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