re: should we get rid of xf86-video-nv?

[matthew green <mrg%eterna.com.au@localhost>]

Rin Okuyama writes:
> Hi,
>
> On 2021/11/13 2:23, Michael wrote:
> > As long as we don't have drm on macppc, and we probably never will,
>
> Isn't this too pessimistic? ;)
>
> nouveau(4) is working on aarch64:
>
> https://dmesgd.nycbug.org/index.cgi?do=view&id=5834
>
> I will buy a cheap card to check whether it can be used on aarch64eb.
>
> If it is no problem with big endian, IIUC, the missing part for powerpc
> should be __HAVE_PMAP_PV_TRACK support to oea pmap. I don't know how hard
> it is, but expect it is straightforward, c.f.:
>
> http://www.nerv.org/netbsd/?q=id:20201220T163826Z.809a29116767ce2d78a3ac3fae5edd5b908f26d6

while this would be a good option, what's the benefit of
enabling an very large kernel driver for hardware that is
pretty well supported by the existing driver?  to give some
idea, the driver on amd64 is 1894223 bytes (size -t on
"nouveau*.o"), matched with 245851 bytes in nouveau_drv.so,
vs the 181321 byte nv_drv.o.  (for reference, the macppc
GENERIC is currently in the 11833223 byte range.)

i used this setup with a G4 powermac as my tv for several
years in the mid 2000s, and unless you're using a GL heavy
application, i'm not sure of the benefit, and see a bunch
of downsides.

having it work for pcie and modern cards would be great,
but i don't think removing the "nv" driver would ever be
worth while.  i can vaguely imagine having nouveau as a
default later..


.mrg.