Linked by Thom Holwerda on Wed 9th Sep 2009 22:29 UTC, submitted by lemur2
Open source 3D graphics drivers for ATI R600 garphics cards has been submitted to the kernel-next tree for possible inclusion in the Linux kernel 2.6.32. "David Airlie has pushed a horde of new code into his drm-next Git tree, which is what will get pulled into the Linux 2.6.32 kernel once the merge window is open. Most prominently, this new DRM code brings support for kernel mode-setting with R600 class hardware as well as 3D support."
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Member since:
2007-02-17
If you can't fix any issues with the code or do some coding yourself then you're still subject to the whims of whomever is developing the driver, OSS or not. So you're still not in control of your own machine.
There were two or three different FOSS projects developing a driver for ATI garphics cards, given the documentation from ATI.
There was the radeonhd project at Novell (I think) and then this project for which the driver was called radeon. I think there may have been one other.
This project ended up being a merge of a few different codebases, AFAIK. There were a couple of different approaches taken.
So no, with FOSS, you are often not dependent on the whims of one developer. The best effort often gets there first, amongst a couple of different efforts or sometimes a handful.
It is a meritocarcy. The best solution (as determined by what works best and what answers the most needs) wins. Other solutions either drop by the wayside, or go on to become an alternative choice.
Edited 2009-09-13 08:15 UTC