DRI2 Protocol Gets Updated, Again

[phoronix]

Phoronix: DRI2 Protocol Gets Updated, Again

Plans for version 2 of the Direct Rendering Infrastructure, or better known as DRI2, had come about last year at the 2007 X Developers' Summit. DRI2 allows for a number of technical improvements within X.Org graphics drivers, but for end-users it provides accelerated direct rendering to redirected windows...

http://www.phoronix.com/vr.php?view=Njc4NQ

[avilella]

This is very interesting. Seeing DRI back into the picture is very promising. Thanks for reporting on this topic and thanks in advance for more posts on it!

[Louise]

Can anyone explain why we need GEM and DRI2?

Does they have different pros and cons?

[Pfanne]

Can anyone explain why we need GEM and DRI2?

Does they have different pros and cons?

ever tried to use compiz with a 3d application?
on ati cards you will have some nice flicker effects and no compositing on the rendered part of the screen...
dri2 will solve this problem!

btw... does anyone know if we can expect fglrx to adopt dri2 as soon as xserver 1.6 is released?

[Nille]

Is DRI2 now finaly done ?

[JeanPaul145]

No other drivers, however, have yet to fully adopt this latest version.

Shouldn't this be something like

The other drivers, however, have yet to fully adopt this latest version.

or something?

I mean, it would be great if all the other drivers have been adapted already, but I doubt that was the intention of the sentence.

Is DRI2 now finaly done ?

No non-trivial software is ever done

But yes, from this article you can conclude that, if all goes well, DRI2 will be incorporated into Ubuntu 9.04, Fedora 11, whatever Novell comes up with by that time, and all the other distro's.

[elanthis]

But yes, from this article you can conclude that, if all goes well, DRI2 will be incorporated into Ubuntu 9.04, Fedora 11, whatever Novell comes up with by that time, and all the other distro's.

No, you cannot conclude that. DRI2 is not done. It's rather clearly stated that there are various missing yet required bits from DRI2, like page swapping support (get rid of flicker). There is no time scale given to guarantee that these parts will be done and stable for releases coming out in a mere 6 months time; DRI2 would need to be finished, and all drivers updated to it, and all drivers tested thoroughly in about 4 months in order to be likely to land in a release 6 months from now.

[JeanPaul145]

No, you cannot conclude that. DRI2 is not done. It's rather clearly stated that there are various missing yet required bits from DRI2, like page swapping support (get rid of flicker). There is no time scale given to guarantee that these parts will be done and stable for releases coming out in a mere 6 months time; DRI2 would need to be finished, and all drivers updated to it, and all drivers tested thoroughly in about 4 months in order to be likely to land in a release 6 months from now.

If the deadline of 6 months isn't met, then clearly all hasn't gone well

[elanthis]

If the deadline of 6 months isn't met, then clearly all hasn't gone well

Six months -- including integration and testing by the actual distributions in preparation for their releases -- is not that long of a time at all. DRI2 has already been in development for over a year. As have the Open Source ATI drivers, the Intel driver, Gallium, KMS, etc., and we're all still sitting here waiting for things to finally "be done right." Things are moving at a decent pace, but I wouldn't count on anything being done by any deadline.

Six months is not a long time.