Talk:Free and open-source graphics device driver

message: This is a very important passage of this entire article. Yet it does not reflect on the problems faced by the hardware manufacturers. It is absurd, that philosophical POVs are mentioned, but not ones of the hardware developers.
I stumbled upon an Interview with Terry Makedon, Chief Software Product Manager for the AMD Catalyst, which does point out quite clearly why manufacturers have such a hard time with free and open-source drivers. Sadly they are in german:
* AMD-Interview: "Wir können unsere Treiber nicht offen legen" Part 1
* AMD-Interview: "Wir können unsere Treiber nicht offen legen" Part 2
A TODO is to uses the explanations by Terry Makedon to depict the POV of the hardware developers, which are clearly missing in the article. I am going to do it, but it could take some time, so if somebody is bored (and speaks German) he or she could do this as well. It also should be possible to find Interviews/Videos in English or other languages. This is just a very good one, I stumbled upon. ScotXW (talk) 10:59, 30 August 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Problems with binary drivers 

message: I think, this is so important, that it deserves an own passage. There is material in the article, especially (or exclusively) with reference to benchmarks done by Phoronix ScotXW (talk) 10:59, 30 August 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Missing passage: Performance Comparison 

message: The software architecture in the meaning of framework for writing graphics drivers for the Unix-like operating systems is problematic. For device drivers for sound cards there is Advanced Linux Sound Architecture, which has been stable for a longer time. Making it unnecessary for developers to rewrite the driver for a different kernel framework.
On the graphics side, we have a couple of changes during the entire X_Window_System#Release_history, which required drivers to be rewritten. ATM, there is still quite some development going on, with regards to GEM vs. TTM and DRI vs. Gallium3D, KMS vs. current and future Android Kernel mode setting modules.
Wayland will work on top of EGL (and, as far as I comprehend, thus deprecate the necessity for display server-drivers.)
Available free and open-source implementation of APIs should also be mentioned. There is Mesa, which implements OpenGL, (but only up until 3.2, whereas 4.2 is available), OpenGL ES, OpenVG and also EGL. There is also the Gallium3D State Tracker for Direct3D version 9. It works on top of Microsoft Windows and also in conjunction with Linux when running Wine. ScotXW (talk) 10:59, 30 August 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Missing passage: Software architecture 

message: I created this article because it's a distinct topic in its own right, with a history going back years. The situation is very confused and this article could help to clarify it. It's far too specialised to be merged with the NVIDIA and/or FOSS articles, IMHO. Spliced 15:52, 13 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Raison d'être

message: Most members of the Linux kernel development community detest binary drivers [1] and some actively seek to make life difficult for people who develop and use them. Binary drivers may only work with a particular kernel version, whereas FOSS drivers are built right into the mainstream kernel source, enabling users to take compatibility for granted.
It may also be the case that binary-only kernel modules, because they do not comply with the GNU General Public License, are a violation of the kernel developers' copyright.
*The above statements contain weasel words to make uncited allegations against kernel developers on both sides of the issue.  Citations and/or rewording is in order. BigE1977 21:16, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Weasel words in the article introduction

message: Maybe this article would be both more neutral and more useful if it was broadened into, say, "Graphics hardware and FOSS". Then a comparison could be made between nVidia, ATI and Intel and the relative merits of each with FOSS. ATI provides 3D-related documentation (under NDA) to X.Org developers for up to the 9200, but nothing more recent. Intel is actively participating in X.Org's development of full 3D support for its new GMA 3000 and X3000 chipsets. If I hear nothing I'll assume I have everyone's blessing to 'be bold' and just do it. :-) Harumphy 16:16, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Please, do not consider that NDA is acceptable for the Free software community. Specifically about ATI, see their incident with rms on the MIT campus. I think we should not get rid of this article, but leave it as it is, and write a general article about Free graphics hardware in addition to this very article. This article already has some information specific to NVIDIA. MureninC 18:43, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

text: I think moving this article and expanding it to cover all graphics hardware is an excellent idea. NicM 18:15, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yeah, why not turn it into a general article, including NVIDIA-specific information under a relevant section? There doesn't seem to be an "ATI vs FOSS" articl yet. -- intgr 16:20, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

text: There seems to be a consensus in favour of this, so I've made a start. Harumphy 19:18, 21 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Proposed name change and expansion

message: Why are there two sections on FOSS support from all the different manufacturers? --Ysangkok 13:28, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Off-topic: Damn that bot is fast. I forgot to sign and five seconds later it had already added an "unsigned" template. --Ysangkok 13:29, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

text: There aren't, one is manufacturer's support for their hardware in FOSS and the other is "native" FOSS support for graphics hardware. However, they are both pretty short and the second one is a bit useless, so merging them could be a nice idea. NicM 14:20, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Done it. Harumphy 16:52, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Question 

message: This article has just become a ragbag of stuff and a bit of mess. I rewrote most of it, but then realised it wasn't really clear what it was about. Is this supposed to be:
*A discussion of binary graphics drivers and OSS. If so, it should be renamed to something like "Graphics hardware and binary drivers" and a lot of stuff trimmed to make it more tightly focused (I have done most of this but not saved it yet).
*A survey of wide use of graphics hardware on OSS, in which case it needs restructuring to make it clear it is discussing all graphics hardware, limit the binary stuff to graphics hardware and trim and tidy some of the messy bits. There is also the question of whether an article on this subject is appropriate.
In either case, some of it needs better attribution and some stuff could just plain go (the Microsoft conspiracy bit for a start, and it is probably only necessary to say there is a driver for Intel chips, we don't need to list all the distros that have it).
NicM 10:20, 29 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  As I see it, the article is supposed to be about the use of graphics hardware with FOSS - i.e. with free/open accelerated 3D drivers. It certainly was never meant to be about binary drivers, other than to explain why they're seen as a problem (in order to provide context). The main purpose of the article is to summarise the availability and development of free/open accelerated 3D drivers in order to inform end users who wish to use them. --Harumphy 12:54, 29 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I'll tidy it up a bit with that in mind, but I'm not convinced an article with that purpose is encylopedic, WP:NOT manual or guidebook. NicM 13:22, 29 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Oh well. There are so many things that WP is not one wonders if there's anything left that WP still is. :-) --Harumphy 14:56, 29 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Article problems

message: Thumperward has slapped an ugly great tag at the top of the article, and commented in his edit(s) that it reads like someone's homework. This doesn't make any sense to me and I don't understand what he's on about. It would be much more helpful if people improved articles instead of taking it upon themselves to 'mark' other people's work like some self-appointed schoolmarm. Constructive editing is welcome. Incomprehensible hit-and-run defacement and bossiness are not. --Harumphy 11:01, 17 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Agreed. --Daniel11 11:16, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

text: It isn't "defacement", it's an accurate assessment of the current prose, and if people are going to take offense to their work being tagged by other editors in good faith as a first act towards improving it then I'd imagine they're too thin-skinned to have much of a future in Wikipedia editing anyway. For the time being it reads not like a description of an object, project or process but as a discussion, mostly synthesised from sources which do not address the issue themselves directly, of the state of the art of the topic. This is not befitting an encyclopedia article. The tag alerts others to the need for the article to either be rewritten to conform with Wikipedia's expectations of article content, or to be moved to another WikiMedia project where it would fit better in its current form. Chris Cunningham 12:03, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: What part of the article is "synthesized from sources"? Did you actually have a look at the sources? I don't know about the lead section, but everything else was properly sourced last time I dealt with this article. -- intgr [talk] 00:03, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  The point of WP:SYN is that individual parts can all be properly sourced, but if you then use those discrete arguments to advance a position not expressed by the originals, or compare the positions in those sources to one another when the sources make no such comparison, you're synthesising. Reference 20, for instance, devotes a full half-sentence to open source, and in the reference does so in a section about NDAs. We've got it supporting binary drivers. Chris Cunningham 07:02, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Reference 20 devotes a full section with three paragraphs to open source drivers; please refer to one titled "Elimination of Open-source Hardware Support". -- intgr [talk] 09:04, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

text:  Slapping a tag on an article without a word of explanation is not a useful 'first act towards improving it ' and isn't likely to be seen as being in good faith. It's akin to saying "this article sucks and you're all idiots. I'm not going to tell you why, work it out yourself." Saying that an article "reads like an essay" is an incredibly uninformative criticism, because "like an essay" is so vague it's meaningless. (There are many types of essay.) It's necessary to lead by example - by actually doing the kind of editing that you want others to do - or at least to criticise *constructively*. People who have Asperger's syndrome are probably too insensitive to others to have much of a future in Wikipedia editing anyway. --Harumphy 10:46, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  So take it up with the authors of template:essay-entry. I tagged the article as a reminder to myself to go back and improve it as much as for any other reason, and do indeed plan to tackle this at some point, but consensus thus far on WP goes that cleanup tags are not intended to be taken personally and using them isn't to be specifically avoided for any reason. Chris Cunningham 11:43, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Right. In future, could you please refrain from using WP articles as your personal notebook? TIA. Much as though a battle with the unholy army of cleanup-tag graffiti artists is needed, life's too short.  --Harumphy 13:58, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  While I've been called many silly names on Wikipedia, this is officially the first time I've been referred to as a footsoldier of "the unholy army of cleanup-tag graffiti artists". Safe to say that I don't take editing tips from people who can't give them civilly, though. Chris Cunningham 14:48, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

text: Three against, no one agreeing, (no comment from me) tag removed. --Gronky 10:52, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  This isn't a vote. You want the tag removed, clean the article up. Chris Cunningham 10:59, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: WP:OWN - but I don't edit enough to be able to have the revert war your offering.  The tag should be removed because it is incorrect. --Gronky 11:01, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  As with your other accusations of bad faith against me, this one is ludicrous. I'm hardly owning an article by insisting that a tag inviting others to edit it be kept. Anyway, I've had a think about this, and seeing as the GPU article doesn't have a drivers section just now that's probably the best place to add a (distilled) version of this. The debate around which this article currently centres is only notable in the wider context presented there. Chris Cunningham 11:21, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: You're right in a way, but there are two angles on this.  One is about GPUs, but there is also the issue of the free software community's debates, campaigns, and acceptance of free and non-free drivers.  Graphics card drivers have sparked debates about binary bits in the kernel, down to what level does software freedom matter, is it a security issue, will we ever win - if so, how, if maybe not, is it worth the fight. etc.  It's really been a big thing. --Gronky 11:29, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  That's true, but the point is that "Graphics hardware and FOSS" is not a subject in and of itself. It is a subset of one of two things; graphics cards, and free software. Discussion of its intricacies is only relevant in the context of one of those two topics. As a standalone article, it can't really be anything more than an essay. Hence the merge tag. Chris Cunningham 11:36, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: "Free and open source software (FOSS) can be used with a variety of graphics hardware, largely via the X.Org project." It's clearly a process. --Daniel11 12:14, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

text:  It looks to me as though Thumperward/Chris Cunningham is just trolling. Anyone can edit a WP article - they don't need inviting to do so by a cleanup tag. --Harumphy 11:43, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  That argument has been had and lost on a wider scale. There's nothing wrong with tagging articles, there's no offense intended to the editors who have worked on it before, and I'm not accepting your declaration that the issue should be discussed further at the same time as you're dismissing my arguments with random accusations of bad faith - which you've done on several occasions now. Chris Cunningham 12:08, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The reason Harumphy and others took offense is that you wrote in your edit summary: "(tag. this is someone's homework)" -- i.e. in addition to informing them that you were placing a tag on the article, you insulted the people who wrote it by calling it their "homework." Harumphy has been caustic in response where he/she could have been more polite (although I found the responses funny), but I believe you initiated the feeling of confrontation, whether intentionally or not. --Daniel11 12:20, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Fine, I apologise for that. At least I was still commenting on the work as opposed to commenting on the user. WP:HESTARTEDIT isn't currently policy, and I've come to the talk page to discuss it as well as making moves to suggest what should be done with it (merging to a less abstract article). Chris Cunningham 12:25, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: How about a move to a more specific, descriptive title? Something like "Use of graphics hardware with FOSS," or "Hardware acceleration with FOSS," or something like that? --Daniel11 12:33, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  If I thought the title was the only problem, I'd have made that clear. The whole article is a report on the state of the art of an abstract concept, the intermingling of the free software movement with the highly proprietary modern graphics card market. The target is moving, it isn't strictly defined in the first place, and such as it is defined it isn't often reported on in and of itself by notable sources in anything other than a reporting manner. Take a look at the original article and tell me that it describes a thing, a concept worthy of an encyclopedia as opposed to an incidental historic note on the state of a) free software or b) graphics drivers. I don't see the current version of the article as being any better-defined in that area. Chris Cunningham 12:51, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

text: I'm not really all that comfortable with the article as it stands either. I think the article is sort of neither one thing nor t'other. It seems that it covers two distinct topics: a survey of the current state of graphics hardware interoperability with FOSS, which is a bit nebulous, and mostly X.Org anyway, and some information on the binary blob debate. I think the latter material (the "Issues with binary drivers" section) would be much better extended and merged into another article more specific to the subject, probably a "Graphics hardware" section of binary blob itself. I'm not really totally sure about the former stuff—but there isn't an awful lot of real content and it does sort of seem now that it is either stuff that might be better in video card; stuff that would be better in X.Org Server or another X.Org article; or stuff that is shopping guide/Linux HOWTO (although I think there isn't much of that now), which should probably be removed altogether. I'm not really sure there is anything that could be added to make the article more solid, the subject is sort of a little ill-defined: it isn't really something where a history section, or technical details, or anything else that might normally appear feels right. NicM 19:07, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Essay?

message: "Alas Nvidia is too used to trying to make games appear a couple of fps
faster by any hacks possible, rather than actually wanting to work
with the developer community to solve the scalability problem
properly..."   —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.83.72.47 (talk) 09:44, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Perceptions by key people behind major open source projects 

message: In the section Problems with binary drivers, can although NVIDIA have denied this, asserting that the issue was only communicated to them in July 2006 and that the 2004 bug was a bug in X.Org, not in NVIDIA's driver. be changed to although NVIDIA have denied this, asserting that the issue was only communicated to them in July 2006, and that the 2004 bug was in X.Org, and not in NVIDIA's driver.. Kushalt 12:29, 27 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  minor suggestion 

message: Anyone want to edit the article to mention this?   — SheeEttin {T/C} 03:40, 31 March 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  nvidia drops support for nv 

message: I changed the misspelled "AIT" to ATI"
108.11.130.56 (talk) 13:13, 13 December 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Spelling Change

message: SoCs that include one (or multiple) GPU/GPU-like IC-Blocks are e.g. Apple Ax, OMAP, Snapdragon, Tegra, NovaThor, Exynos, etc.
* Qualcomm's Adreno
* ARM's Mali
* Broadcom's VideoCore
* Imagination Technologies's PowerVR
Please also read Talk:Graphics_processing_unit#No_mention_of_Silicon_Graphics.3F, because sometime these units are called multimedia processors. At least the VideoCore is reported Here: Ars Technica: Video iPod – Vivisection to replace the "Wolfson audio codec" and add "video processing and output" Doors5678 (talk) 18:06, 13 April 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Mention of GPUs embedded in SoCs 

message: Please update Broadcom section from this article: http://www.raspberrypi.org/archives/2221 --LeNiN (talk) 07:44, 26 October 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: I hope I did a reasonable decent job. Mahjongg (talk) 00:18, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
replies: text:  Thank you! --LeNiN (talk) 07:38, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Broadcom VideoCore OpenSource driver 

message: Example: http://cvsweb.xfree86.org/cvsweb/xc/programs/Xserver/hw/xfree86/vga256/drivers/nv/Attic/nv3driver.c.diff?r1=1.1.2.5&r2=1.1.2.6&hideattic=0&only_with_tag=xf-3_3_3
Before:
 MapDevice(PFIFO,regBase);
After:
 nvPFIFOPort=(unsigned*)xf86MapVidMem(vga256InfoRec.scrnIndex, 3 , ((char*)( regBase ))+ (8192) , ((16383) - (8192) +1) ) ;
The message about obfuscation: http://cvsweb.xfree86.org/cvsweb/xc/programs/Xserver/hw/xfree86/vga256/drivers/nv/Attic/README.RIVATNT?rev=1.1.2.3&hideattic=0&only_with_tag=xf-3_3_3&content-type=text/vnd.viewcvs-markup `a5b (talk) 22:30, 23 August 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Obfuscation in nv dirver 

message: I would like to suggest to merge this article into Mesa (computer graphics)#Device drivers. Most, but not all!, free and open-source graphics device driver drivers are being developed inside of the mesa project. User:ScotXWt@lk 11:06, 15 September 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: Would the general rationale for FOSS graphics drivers be in the scope of the Mesa article? Sizeofint (talk) 16:43, 15 September 2015 (UTC)
replies: text:  I certainly do not insist on that. User:ScotXWt@lk 21:54, 14 March 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: There is a lot of content that wouldn't be appropriate for the Mesa article. It is possible that some could be spun off into Free and open source drivers but it is probably more effort than it is worth. It would making discussing non-mesa drivers more difficult as well. IMO a merge isn't necessary at the moment. Sizeofint (talk) 18:30, 15 March 2016 (UTC)

text: Oppose - I think the current solution with the Mesa article having a short paragraph describing the overall situation, and a link here as the main article for further reading is ideal. Both articles are about very different concepts (driver versus API). Mesa as "the" umbrella project is only applicable to Linux/BSD, an admittedly large subset of open source platforms. Both articles are already quite sizeable, and I think merging both would not be helpful in that respect either.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:A62:1181:6301:6188:9441:BA99:A39A (talk) 08:04, 13 June 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Merger proposal 

message: To write that a team has "people like" certain named people is an odd usage for an encyclopedia.
Either it has those named people or it doesn't, and if it doesn't, why are the unnamed people "like" the named  ones?--23.119.204.117 (talk) 07:52, 2 November 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, the entire paragraph is not encyclopedic. I removed it. Sizeofint (talk) 16:04, 2 November 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  "people like" 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: All references belong at the end of the article (not individual sections), and please see WP:NOTTEXTBOOK. Miniapolis 21:07, 14 November 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Citation and prose problems 

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