Re: companies contributing to X [was: Re: Respository vandalism by r...@...fd.o]
Matthew Garrett wrote: > The lack of documentation for various aspects of the server doesn't help > either. I found X development far more intimidating than getting > involved in the kernel. That is something we know we've been lacking for a long time, and have been working to correct. So far most of the efforts have been around getting the docs to a place where people can edit them and then have the toolchain around to see the html/pdf/etc. output. (Matt & Gaetan have made amazing progress here over the last year after years of the rest of us talking about it, though most of that is around client library & protocol level documentation, since that's where the bulk of our existing documentation is, and not so much server/driver side.) For Xorg 1.9, I got the server internals docs in-tree and building with the standardish xmlto tools - now comes the hard part of getting them up-to-date again and having useful contents. The X.Org Board has recently approved Bart's proposal to set aside a few days before the 2011 X Developer Conference for a "book sprint" to produce documentation for developers and hopefully we'll be able to build upon the existing docs, Matt's Summer of Code KMS docs, and Stephane's draft driver writing guide to actually have some good docs for people. -- -Alan Coopersmith-alan.coopersm...@oracle.com Oracle Solaris Platform Engineering: X Window System ___ xorg@lists.freedesktop.org: X.Org support Archives: http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/xorg Info: http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/xorg Your subscription address: arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: companies contributing to X [was: Re: Respository vandalism by r...@...fd.o]
On Thu, Nov 25, 2010 at 09:23:38PM +, Alan Cox wrote: > > but simply being more enthusiastic about accepting contributions doesn't > > seem like a great plan (compare the code quality of nouveau, intel and > > radeon to that of some of the out of tree drivers, for instance) > > I think that is a little naïve. There is a difference between vendors > attempting to use Xorg as a "dump and run" for crap code, and being a bit > more relaxed about obscure drivers that are otherwise unmaintained. I don't entirely agree. If people provide code review and the vendor maintainer's attitude is approximately "We're only willing to work with you if you accept our approach", I don't think that benefits us. It can be an opportunity for learning - I'm just not sure that it has been in the real world, so far. > X is a bit "odd" in other ways - it's history has been rather closed at > times which hasn't helped as it means there isn't a long standing large > developer base. That's certainly true. The small number of developers has been a longstanding issue, and the fact that companies can't really just pick up an existing developer makes all of this much harder. > It consists (for much of the relevant stuff) of a very small number of > very large and very complex drivers for insanely complex bits of > hardware. That doesn't have the same scaling for newbies the kernel does > where there are hundreds of random USB widgets you never knew you needed > that make good starting points. > > Maintaining the old Voodoo2 driver was a bit like minor kernel hacking. I > can't even imagine how KeithP fits everything he needs to know for the > intel drivers into his head. The lack of documentation for various aspects of the server doesn't help either. I found X development far more intimidating than getting involved in the kernel. -- Matthew Garrett | mj...@srcf.ucam.org ___ xorg@lists.freedesktop.org: X.Org support Archives: http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/xorg Info: http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/xorg Your subscription address: arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: companies contributing to X [was: Re: Respository vandalism by r...@...fd.o]
> but simply being more enthusiastic about accepting contributions doesn't > seem like a great plan (compare the code quality of nouveau, intel and > radeon to that of some of the out of tree drivers, for instance) I think that is a little naïve. There is a difference between vendors attempting to use Xorg as a "dump and run" for crap code, and being a bit more relaxed about obscure drivers that are otherwise unmaintained. The latter makes a good ground for people to learn the craft, as indeed can staring at some of the finest vendor Vogon poetry and turning it into something resembling C to help get it upstream. X is a bit "odd" in other ways - it's history has been rather closed at times which hasn't helped as it means there isn't a long standing large developer base. It consists (for much of the relevant stuff) of a very small number of very large and very complex drivers for insanely complex bits of hardware. That doesn't have the same scaling for newbies the kernel does where there are hundreds of random USB widgets you never knew you needed that make good starting points. Maintaining the old Voodoo2 driver was a bit like minor kernel hacking. I can't even imagine how KeithP fits everything he needs to know for the intel drivers into his head. Alan ___ xorg@lists.freedesktop.org: X.Org support Archives: http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/xorg Info: http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/xorg Your subscription address: arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: companies contributing to X [was: Re: Respository vandalism by r...@...fd.o]
On Wed, Nov 24, 2010 at 02:56:32PM -0700, Matt Dew wrote: > This I'm curious about. Are there more companies that feel it's > too-hard/not-worth-while for companies to contribute stuff to Xorg? > I know the linux kernel has this issue, but is X's contribution > difficulty larger? I think X faces the problem that our approach to code quality is pretty similar to the kernel, but the number of skilled coders with domain experience is much smaller. There's a pretty strong cultural mismatch between our willingness to accept patches and people's willingness to submit them. Vendors are willing to argue that their component suppliers have in-kernel drivers, but X.org's modular development model makes it far easier for those suppliers to argue that an "out of tree" X driver is equivalent to something that's maintained within X.org. The unsurprising outcome is that drivers in X.org only tend to be regularly updated if they have someone who can work with the X.org community. If they don't, it's far easier to keep the code in their own tree. Working out ways to improve this situation would seem worthwhile, but simply being more enthusiastic about accepting contributions doesn't seem like a great plan (compare the code quality of nouveau, intel and radeon to that of some of the out of tree drivers, for instance) -- Matthew Garrett | mj...@srcf.ucam.org ___ xorg@lists.freedesktop.org: X.Org support Archives: http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/xorg Info: http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/xorg Your subscription address: arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: companies contributing to X [was: Re: Respository vandalism by r...@...fd.o]
On Wed, Nov 24, 2010 at 02:56:32PM -0700, Matt Dew wrote: > > But you also might want to consider that i was at a hardware vendor two > > weeks ago, and i had to listen to their main engineer calling > > contributing directly to X a waste of time, and that they rather fix > > the versions their customers ship, and hand the patches to their > > customers directly, never bothering to submit to X directly. They rather > > implement stuff, hand it to their customers, as they know that their > > code will not be accepted, and that it will be reinvented a few weeks or > > months later. Then they go and use the reimplementation afterwards, and > > save a lot of manpower and frustration in the process. Despite all my > > personal feelings about free software and the likes, I had absolutely > > nothing to counter, anything i could even try to throw up against that > > would either be completely irrelevant and meek, or a lie. > > This I'm curious about. Are there more companies that feel it's > too-hard/not-worth-while for companies to contribute stuff to Xorg? > I know the linux kernel has this issue, but is X's contribution > difficulty larger? > > I ask out of complete curiosity, not trying to stir any pot. > Matt Yes, a mail like this will get them all to come clean and tell you, publically, that they do not want to contribute back, and then list all the reasons why. That sounds like a good thing for a commercial company to do. Luc Verhaegen. ___ xorg@lists.freedesktop.org: X.Org support Archives: http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/xorg Info: http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/xorg Your subscription address: arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: companies contributing to X [was: Re: Respository vandalism by r...@...fd.o]
Matt, I think what you are asking is: "is the Microsoft FUD working?" The answer is: "yes". Should we roll over and play dead? No, not me. Freedom, as in "free range", Pat --- On Wed, Nov 24, 2010 at 3:56 PM, Matt Dew wrote: > This I'm curious about. Are there more companies that feel it's > too-hard/not-worth-while for companies to contribute stuff to Xorg? ___ xorg@lists.freedesktop.org: X.Org support Archives: http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/xorg Info: http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/xorg Your subscription address: arch...@mail-archive.com
companies contributing to X [was: Re: Respository vandalism by r...@...fd.o]
> But you also might want to consider that i was at a hardware vendor two > weeks ago, and i had to listen to their main engineer calling > contributing directly to X a waste of time, and that they rather fix > the versions their customers ship, and hand the patches to their > customers directly, never bothering to submit to X directly. They rather > implement stuff, hand it to their customers, as they know that their > code will not be accepted, and that it will be reinvented a few weeks or > months later. Then they go and use the reimplementation afterwards, and > save a lot of manpower and frustration in the process. Despite all my > personal feelings about free software and the likes, I had absolutely > nothing to counter, anything i could even try to throw up against that > would either be completely irrelevant and meek, or a lie. This I'm curious about. Are there more companies that feel it's too-hard/not-worth-while for companies to contribute stuff to Xorg? I know the linux kernel has this issue, but is X's contribution difficulty larger? I ask out of complete curiosity, not trying to stir any pot. Matt ___ xorg@lists.freedesktop.org: X.Org support Archives: http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/xorg Info: http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/xorg Your subscription address: arch...@mail-archive.com
