[MPlayer-dev-eng] MGA Xv sux...

[D Richard Felker III]

On Fri, Jul 19, 2002 at 10:20:11PM +0200, Arpi wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> Just browsed some Xv driver's source to find out a better common vidix-like
> interface, with minimal coding requirement to convert an Xv driver to it.
> It seems it's harder than i hope, Xv drivers uses various external XF86
> structures for various purposes :(
> Anyway the design of the whole Xv thing is broken to hell.

XFree86 is broken to hell, in terms of performance and security, and
the developers don't seem to care the least bit about it. I've sent
bug reports and requests for things to be fixed that just go
completely ignored. IMO what's really needed is either a fork, a new
implementation based on the X11R6.4 reference sources, or else a
completely new X server from scratch designed to be clean and
efficient.

In the meantime I've hacked up my X server to make it run as non-root,
so at least I can be rid of the security and stability issues, but
since I don't really use X much (mga_vid and matroxfb are too nice!),
I don't really have too much motivation to continue fixing XF86's
brain damage myself... One interesting thing I did discover, though:
2D accelerating X is 90% worthless. Line drawing, fills, etc. are a
plenty fast nonaccelerated. The only thing that's slow is
video-to-video blits, because video ram is super-slow for reading. So,
if anyone *does* care to make a better X server, they don't need to
spend tons of time on lots of accelerator features. Just accelerated
bitblit, xv, and (if desired) 3d is a plenty!

BTW, anyone care to hear how to get root with DGA *after* the client
drops to normal user? :)

> the only thing which makes me happy is the knowledge that the guy designing
> this shit is now working for nvidia :)

Hahah, wonderful!

Rich