Linked by Thom Holwerda on Tue 14th Sep 2010 22:42 UTC
If there's one consistent piece of criticism that gets lobbed in Canonical's and Mark Shuttleworth's direction, it's that they do not contribute enough code - or anything else for that matter - to the Free software world. Mark Shuttleworth has apparently had enough, and has written a very, very lengthy blog post detailing how he feels about this criticism.
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Member since:2005-07-13
Member since:2009-10-04
If anything, X.org and Mesa are terribly understaffed.
X.org, definitely. But I think Mesa is actually doing pretty well. Progress is happening fast, and it is one of the most active FOSS projects. (Linux and Mozilla are the only projects I know of that might be more active.)
Missing support for GL ES 2.0 and buggy support for GL 2.0-only may result in KDE producing two back-ends for KWin that share next to no code. If Xorg/Mesa supported OpenGL 3.x, 4.x, and ES 2.0 no duplicated KWin development was required.
First of all, Mesa does support GL ES 2.0 (it is used by Wayland). I'm not sure how complete or correct it is. Second, although different graphics APIs might not be compatible, that hardly means that they would share little code. 90% of what works in GL ES 2.0 will also work in GL 2, 3, and 4. GL 3 and 4 would only be used for optional eye-candy or performance enhancing features. The core rendering stuff would be basically the same. Lastly, the renderer is a very small part of a window manager. Drawing rectangles onto the screen is not terribly complicated. The hard part is window management.
Nouveau also could need much help, especially in power management and support for composite window managers.
I agree there. If Canonical could pay a few developers to work on Nouveau, progress would be much faster (and it is already very impressive). It would probably be the most useful thing that they could do with their money.
Member since:2010-02-16
X.org, definitely. But I think Mesa is actually doing pretty well.
If it was so well, where is OpenGL 3.x support? I'm not even beginning to ask for 4.0.
Btw: While both are technically separate projects, they pretty much go hand in hand for 3D-accelerated GPU drivers.
Xorg's GPU drivers can't support higher versions of OpenGL than Mesa offers. And Mesa is f*cked when drivers incorrectly claim to properly support feature X of OpenGL 2.x.
Member since:2007-02-17
Look at the recent problems with KWin 4.5: Those aren't bugs in KWin. Those are driver bugs.
Nothing more recent than OpenGL 2.0 is supported by FOSS drivers and even that support is buggy.
Nothing more recent than OpenGL 2.0 is supported by FOSS drivers and even that support is buggy.
Well it should be pointed out that for the ATI FOSS drivers the programming specifications have only been available for just over a year now. ATI FOSS drivers are entirely new code (AMD/ATI did NOT release their driver code as FOSS, only the programming specifications).
OpenGL support in FOSS drivers (at least, for the ATI FOSS drivers) is buggy because it is so new. It will improve in very short order as the driver gains a bit of maturity.
Member since:2010-02-16
Well it should be pointed out that for the ATI FOSS drivers the programming specifications have only been available for just over a year now. ATI FOSS drivers are entirely new code (AMD/ATI did NOT rel
ease their driver code as FOSS, only the programming specifications).
OpenGL support in FOSS drivers (at least, for the ATI FOSS drivers) is buggy because it is so new. It will improve in very short order as the driver gains a bit of maturity.
ease their driver code as FOSS, only the programming specifications).
OpenGL support in FOSS drivers (at least, for the ATI FOSS drivers) is buggy because it is so new. It will improve in very short order as the driver gains a bit of maturity.
And how does code get marture? By having people to work on it.
Novell worked a while on radeonhd but ever since AMD chose to support the normal radeon driver, Novell stopped to work on radeonhd.
To make matters worse, financial trouble of Novell meant that the radeonhd developer was fired.
That leaves the situation in the following way: AMD works on the driver but only with the barest minimum of resources and only after AMD's slow "Legal Team" gives its OK to work on certain driver features.
Distributors could stept in and at least help stabilizing existing features but Novell currently can't (so they say), Red Hat puts its resources to Nouveau (where they are even more needed), and Canonical simply does nothing.
Member since:2010-04-21
Member since:2010-02-16
There are commercial entities called distributors that make money of Free Software projects.
If for whatever reason a FOSS project is broken and the distributor relies on that, it's the distributor's obligation towards its customers to fix what's broken.
Across the whole Linux stack, Xorg/Mesa is the piece that currently needs the most work.
If the whole FOSS world was made up of volunteer hobby programmers, it would be perfectly OK if FOSS was moving at a slower pace than it actually moves right now. However the world is as it is and commercial distributors exist. As long as they are freeloading, they are behaving against what the FOSS projects as well as the paying customers could expect.
Edited 2010-09-17 00:04 UTC
News
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/20/13 6:17 UTC, submitted by MOS6510
"In the first episode of Microsoft's new film series 'On the Whiteboard', Editor Pamela Woon chats with two-time Oscar winner Randy Thom about the (often underestimated) importance of sound in human-technology interactions. Thom, the lead sound designer at Skywalker Ranch who worked on films such as The Incredibles, Castaway and Forrest Gump, says that people rarely consider the significance of those signature sounds that come from their trusty devices, whether it be a cell phone, a computer or a tablet."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/19/13 23:02 UTC, submitted by M.Onty
"Microsoft has sensationally abandoned its controversial plans to restrict the sharing of XBox One games, and has also removed daily online authentication requirements for its forthcoming console", reports The Guardian. They had no choice. Still a good move.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/19/13 22:28 UTC
"A snippet of code in the Steam digital distribution platform has revealed that Valve may be planning to let users easily share their games with friends in the future. The Verge has verified the code's authenticity, which was originally spotted by a member of the NeoGAF gaming forum; the code references a 'shared game library' and a notification that would alert a user when their games are currently in use by a borrower." This would change the, uh, game.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 22:33 UTC
Official Apple statement on PRISM and privacy: "Regardless of the circumstances, our Legal team conducts an evaluation of each request and, only if appropriate, we retrieve and deliver the narrowest possible set of information to the authorities. In fact, from time to time when we see inconsistencies or inaccuracies in a request, we will refuse to fulfill it." This is basically Apple re-publishing their earlier statement in a more official manner. You either believe it, or you don't.
Linked by Anonymous on 06/18/13 22:26 UTC
The open source Contiki operating system and its commercial Thingsquare distribution are making strides towards the connected home. According to a Computerworld article, a new LED light bulb manufacturer is putting small computers into their light bulbs. Each computer runs the Contiki OS, which gives each bulb an IP address and allows them to be controlled with a smartphone application. To connect the bulbs to the application, the bulbs use both Wi-Fi and the much lower power IEEE 802.15.4 mesh technology.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 22:25 UTC
"Google asked the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court on Tuesday to ease long-standing gag orders over data requests it makes, arguing that the company has a constitutional right to speak about information it's forced to give the government. The legal filing, which cites the First Amendment's guarantee of free speech, is the latest move by the California-based tech giant to protect its reputation in the aftermath of news reports about sweeping National Security Agency surveillance of Internet traffic." Draining the ditch after the cow has drowned in it.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 17:45 UTC
"I can't find one person who has been using the Nexus 7 for an extended period of time, and hasn't seen a massive downgrade in performance. Just what kind of downgrade are we talking here? I cannot pick up my Nexus 7 without experiencing problems like a lag of ten seconds, or more, just to rotate the display; touches refusing to acknowledged; stuttering notification panel actions; and unresponsive apps." Fully and utterly agreed. My Nexus 7 was blazing-fast and awesome for a few months, and at some point, it just started sucking. Just like that. I've tried loads of ROMs, and nothing helps.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 17:32 UTC, submitted by poundsmack
A new release of the hobby operating system MenuetOS! The release notes are a bit non-descript, but you'll have to take what you can get: "updates and improvements (picview, httpc, ehci, ...)".
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/17/13 17:58 UTC
"The Internet is one of the most transformative technologies of our lifetimes. But for 2 out of every 3 people on earth, a fast, affordable Internet connection is still out of reach. And this is far from being a solved problem. There are many terrestrial challenges to Internet connectivity - jungles, archipelagos, mountains. There are also major cost challenges. Right now, for example, in most of the countries in the southern hemisphere, the cost of an Internet connection is more than a month's income. Solving these problems isn't simply a question of time: it requires looking at the problem of access from new angles. So today we're unveiling our latest moonshot from Google[x]: balloon-powered Internet access." Insane.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/17/13 17:52 UTC
"MineAssemble is a tiny bootable Minecraft clone written partly in x86 assembly. I made it first and foremost because a university assignment required me to implement a game in assembly for a computer systems course. Because I had never implemented anything more complex than a 'Hello World' bootloader before, I decided I wanted to learn about writing my own kernel code at the same time. Note that the goal of this project was not to write highly efficient hand-optimized assembly code, but rather to have fun and write code that balances readability and speed. This is primarily accomplished by proper commenting and consistent code structuring." Just cool.More News »
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Member since:
2010-02-16
Do you mean Linux as kernel or the ecosystem?
If you mean ecosystem: Hahahahahahaha!
If anything, X.org and Mesa are terribly understaffed.
Look at the recent problems with KWin 4.5: Those aren't bugs in KWin. Those are driver bugs.
Nothing more recent than OpenGL 2.0 is supported by FOSS drivers and even that support is buggy.
KDE aims to become a player in the mobile space which means that KWin will be ported to OpenGL ES 2.0. Sadly OpenGL 1.x and ES 2.0 are pretty much incompatible.
Missing support for GL ES 2.0 and buggy support for GL 2.0-only may result in KDE producing two back-ends for KWin that share next to no code. If Xorg/Mesa supported OpenGL 3.x, 4.x, and ES 2.0 no duplicated KWin development was required.
Nouveau also could need much help, especially in power management and support for composite window managers.
Voluntary developers can only do so much and GPU developers don't want to spend more resources on Xorg/Mesa.
Xorg/Mesa needs full-time developers of commercial distributors. Red Hat contributes a lot, so do Sun/Oracle and Apple (yes, Apple!). Novell does less but still contributes. Mandriva does a bit.
Canonical, sadly, nothing.