Re: Article on state of graphics drivers on BSDs

[Thor Lancelot Simon <tls%panix.com@localhost>]

On Wed, Feb 13, 2013 at 07:06:02PM -0500, James K. Lowden wrote:
> 
> The problem is not that kernels differ.  The problem is that X is no
> longer portable.  It no longer provides a machine-independent
> layer for the driver.  There is no reason, theoretically, that a
> graphics driver should be tied to the kernel, but that's what's
> happened.  

I'm not sure I buy that.  Certainly there are very good reasons why
a graphics driver that is *not* in the kernel should not be allowed
to bang directly on the graphics hardware (which usually contains
DMA engines that can scribble all over physical memory of the host,
etc).

Thor