On 7/13/07, Dieter <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Generic comment on slides: Sometimes one hears a talk and later looks
over the slides, or, these days, often finds the slides on the web
without having heard the talk. It is nice if the slides can remind you
of the talk, or better yet, stand alone and get the main points across.
> Until recently, it's been hard to get graphics cards that work well
> with Free Software.
You mean there *are* some?
I think Matrox has FOSS drivers for their latest stuff (G550?),
although not 100% support. And Intel is working on stuff. Also, AMD
has been talking about it. Also, you can STILL get FOSS drivers for
older Radeon chips.
I don't want to say there aren't any and get caught in a lie, but it's
also true that what support there is sucks.
> Our design is largely a derivative of 1990's-style fixed-function
Given the rate of tech progress, "1990's" makes it sound obsolete,
practically prehistoric.
I know. But any other description uses words that many audience
members won't understand, like "rasterizer and fixed-function fragment
shader".
How about this:
To figure out how to develop something feasible, we started by
examining GPU designs from the 1990s and have worked forward from
there.
The problem with this wording is it sounds like I'm equivocating.
> We based our design on the OpenGL 2.0 spec but
> restricted the features mostly to that of OpenGL 1.3.
Would it be accurate to say "OpenGL 1.3 plus some of OpenGL 2.0" ?
Hearing that you are getting "more than 1.3" sounds nicer than hearing
"less than 2.0".
Ok. How about this:
We decided that the OpenGL 1.3 feature set would be a good minimum for
a useful desktop GPU. However, we got all of our information and math
from the OpenGL 2.0 spec.
This sucks too. I'm not sure how to explain that I used the OpenGL
2.0 spec as a reference but ignored all of the ARB (programmable
shader) stuff. We also decidec on a few other restrictions, like
cutting the number of texture units to 2 from 4. There's also some
other ambient environment thing we dropped.
> If you have money to burn, you can donate to the OHF.
I would leave out the "If you have money to burn". Who feels that they
have money to burn? Maybe something like
Fair enough. :)
How about:
If you would like to help out financially, you can donate to the OHF.
If your finances allow, you can donate to the OHF. If you have hardware
talent, you can assist with the design work. If you have software talent,
you can assist with CAD tools, device drivers, etc. If you have a business
that could use our chip, we would be happy to discuss it with you.
Ok, I like this.
> [When do you expect to release these products]
> OGD1 is basically done. We've identified all of the bugs. There are
> just some tedious steps remaining to do before we can hand it off to
> a board house and have them mass-produced. The other major thing is
> OGA1. That's a big open question. One problem is the money.
This sounds like it is OGA1 rather than TRV10 that needs the big money.
Got it.
> Prices
> change, so we can't say exactly how much it would cost, but we either
> need to raise a lot of money, or more likely, we need to find partners
I'd leave out the "more likely". Don't want to discourage someone who
has an idea on how to raise the money.
Good idea. I was trying to show a sense of realism, but you have a point.
> with deep pockets who would like no-strings-attached rights to the
> techology.
I'd make this more generic. Maybe something like "or we need to find
partners who are interested in the technology."
Good.
> The next problem is fabrication. Even if we could design
> and finish testing OGA1 infinitely fast, it would still take 6 months
> to get chips in our hands.
Does it really take 6 months to get a chip fabbed? (once it is layed out
and ready to go) This is just everyday vanilla silicon, right? Nothing
exotic like bipolar ECL, or Gaas, or bleeding edge feature sizes, ...
I think this isn't JUST fabrication of silicon. I'll verify with Howard.
--
Timothy Normand Miller
http://www.cse.ohio-state.edu/~millerti
Open Graphics Project
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