Re: GGI, EGCS/PGCC, Kernel source

Ulrich Windl (linker@nightshade.ml.org)
Mon, 23 Feb 1998 04:08:02 -0500 (EST)


I agree that GGI seems a bit 'bulkey' but it's obvious (from looking at
their snapshots) that they have done TONS of work to make it as small and
clean as possible.

Part of the reason it's so complicated is because of all the things it
does.. I really dont think that it's anymore complicated then the network
subsytem.

Here are some of the things they are shooting at..

*Output device abstraction
*Input device independence
*Platform indepence
*Kernel Level Hardware control (most IMPORTANT part.. IHMO )
*Mutiple input/output devices
*Multihead from the consol level up..
*High performance
*Access to fancy hardware features (this is tough when you consider they
are trying to be abstract)

Not to mention libggi..

So I think that they have done a great job so far in keeping it small and
clean..

Can you think of a better way of say poping in two pci video cards and two
keyboards (one on the ps2mouse port) and two mice and having a single
computer act as two for all apps in a transparent way?

On 23 Feb 1998, Jes Degn Soerensen wrote:

[snip]
> There is also the question whether GGI is the right approach or not!
> On the m68k we need to use framebuffers and thus framebuffer consoles,
> however I have not seen a lot of evidence that it will actually buy us
> a lot to tale the GGI approach rather than the nice and fairly simple
> `fbcon' style we use now. Bascially fbcon (and the abstract console
> system) allows for framebuffer consoles, VGA-like text mode consoles,
> consoles on weird devices such as TIGA boards and it allows for
> screen-mode switching in the kernel, which is necessary for the
> framebuffer devices. I can't see a lot of other graphics related
> issues that needs to go into the kernel.
>
> Hounestly, I do not follow the GGI development closely due to lack of
> time, but what I hear from the m68k guys who have been spending time
> playing with GGI I have not been overly impressed. Things might have
> improved a lot but I still have the impression that GGI is not heading
> for simplicity (no offense, I could be wrong), which I consider to be
> one of the key issues.
>
> Jes

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