> From: kpneal@unity.ncsu.edu
> Date: Wed, 24 Jan 1996 00:49:23 -0500 (EST)

> > Matthew green wrote (in his message from Mon 22)
> > 
> > Yes. root is basically needed to get access to i/o operations on the
> > VGA cards. This is very difficult to suppress. It would mean:
> > 
> > 1. Write a device driver for each different graphic board on the
> >    market (it should probably implement the mi level of the Xserver to
> >    be safe)
> > 2. Have XFree86 (and the other available servers) use them.
> > 
> 
> Which would mean that NetBSD would have exactly 1 Xserver program
> that would run on all supported platforms, where these devices exist.

In a Perfect World, the kernel should take care of the actual low-level
device-driving, not the X server. Kernel bloat might be avoided by
having a basic VGA driver in the kernel, and loading an LKM for the
right video card once you need to get more out of it.

The problem is, that it would be a big effort to keep track of all available
cards. Currently, the XFree86 folks do it for us, I am not complaining ;-)

- Frank