From owner-freebsd-current Mon Mar 23 21:38:20 1998 Return-Path: Received: (from majordom@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) id VAA21180 for freebsd-current-outgoing; Mon, 23 Mar 1998 21:38:20 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from owner-freebsd-current@FreeBSD.ORG) Received: from dingo.cdrom.com (dingo.cdrom.com [204.216.28.145]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id VAA21169; Mon, 23 Mar 1998 21:38:16 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from mike@dingo.cdrom.com) Received: from dingo.cdrom.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by dingo.cdrom.com (8.8.8/8.8.5) with ESMTP id VAA15384; Mon, 23 Mar 1998 21:32:47 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: <199803240532.VAA15384@dingo.cdrom.com> X-Mailer: exmh version 2.0zeta 7/24/97 To: "Daniel O'Connor" cc: Mike Smith , "Daniel O'Connor" , Andrzej Bialecki , =?ISO-8859-2?Q?S=F8ren_Schmidt?= , Jonathan Lemon , current@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: BIOS calls In-reply-to: Your message of "Tue, 24 Mar 1998 15:44:03 +1030." <199803240514.PAA10765@cain.gsoft.com.au> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Date: Mon, 23 Mar 1998 21:32:46 -0800 From: Mike Smith Sender: owner-freebsd-current@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG > > Just bolt it into syscons instead of the current mode changing. Much > > more orthogonal. But one thing at a time - this code needs testing and > > cleaning. Start there. > Hmm.. wouldn't this end up kind of fat? If you make it a seperate LKM, then > you can recompile it with different code for different cards.. Of course you > could make syscons an LKM, and do the same thing, but I've never tried to get > _that_ working... Uh, the whole point is that you use the VESA BIOS, so there's nothing to "get fat". It's all on the card already. > > > Gee.. Lets just port the GGI API.. They are working on an X server which us > > > GGI.. Mmm, no more unreadable kernel messages when your X server crashes.. > > *Yawn* The GGI stuff hasn't exactly impressed anyone with the speed > > with which it (hasn't) improved recently. I can't see it congealing > > into anything really useful before GLiDE completely obsoletes it. 8) > Hmm.. well I can't say I ever looked at its speed :) > But it did have several advantages in my mind in that it was in the kernel so > it fixes the annoying "Oh dear my X server just died" problems (mostly), and That's what calling the VESA BIOS gets us. Without having to have a single line of hardware-specific code in the kernel, we can call the card's BIOS which knows all about the hardware. (This is all, of course, modulo BIOS bugs. Hah.) -- \\ Sometimes you're ahead, \\ Mike Smith \\ sometimes you're behind. \\ mike@smith.net.au \\ The race is long, and in the \\ msmith@freebsd.org \\ end it's only with yourself. \\ msmith@cdrom.com To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-current" in the body of the message