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Wine Gets Direct3D Support

Posted by timothy on from the daddy-what-was-'windows'? dept.

chromatic writes: "Looks like a company called TransGaming Technologies has been improving DirectX support in Wine. They plan to use a modified Street Performer Protocol to make money, and will eventually relicense their patches under the Wine license. Maybe I'll finally be able to run Thief!" And maybe one day Xbill will run on Windows.

5 of 156 comments (clear)

  1. Great! by Looke · · Score: 4

    Very good! The reason many still have Windows on their computer isn't MS Office and friends, but games.

  2. A couple of questions. by Lover's+Arrival,+The · · Score: 4
    Hi all! There are a couple of things that I have wondered about the WINE project, and I was wondering if you could enlighten me:

    1) Is it true that the WINE project could one day run Windows programs faster than Windows does itself? I would have thought that with the open nature of the program code, it would just get faster and faster until it outstrips Windows itself. If this is true, then it would be great for playing games on ;)

    2) Is it likely that Microsoft will deliberately try to scupper the WINE project by introducing new API's that are top secret but required to make MS programs work? Or perhaps try their hand legally? But then, I'd have thought that the WINE project benifits Microsoft in a perverse way, by giving them another market to sell to.

    Brrrr. I just can't get over how cold NE America is. I can't get used to it at all! :o)

    --

    --Anticipation of a New Lover's Arrival, The

    1. Re:A couple of questions. by SurfsUp · · Score: 5
      1) Is it true that the WINE project could one day run Windows programs faster than Windows does itself? I would have thought that with the open nature of the program code, it would just get faster and faster until it outstrips Windows itself. If this is true, then it would be great for playing games on ;)

      Oh yes, that's possible and likely. For example, the underlying memory management and disk IO can be faster and better than Windows (it already is), drivers can be better (3D drivers for NVidia and Matrox are already running neck and neck with windows drivers, held back only by 2D blitting support, which is being worked on) system calls can be handled more efficiently, etc. etc.

      2) Is it likely that Microsoft will deliberately try to scupper the WINE project by introducing new API's that are top secret but required to make MS programs work?

      It wouldn't work. There is no way MS can keep any api's secret - we can always run the windows program under emulation to see what it does if we need to. Usually it isn't necessary, and dont forget, secret api's are a pain for windows developers as well, even Microsoft developers. Plus having hidden api's discovered would be a little inconvenient for Microsoft's appeal of the split-up order.

      Or perhaps try their hand legally?

      Yes, for sure they will try to use legal means, it's their only chance to stop us. DMCA and such things show they're already on the march. We have to fight that. Deal: you fight the DCMA, and I'll keep working on the kernel, ok?

      But then, I'd have thought that the WINE project benifits Microsoft in a perverse way, by giving them another market to sell to.

      It lets others compete with Microsoft freely. Microsoft management wouldn't know what to do then, they only know how to play when they get to write the rules. If Microsoft can't control the platform its entire business model goes out the window.
      --

      --
      Life's a bitch but somebody's gotta do it.
  3. Is compatibility good? Remember OS/2... by Soft · · Score: 5

    WINE is certainly a nice thing to have. However, I'm wondering whether it really is doing more good than harm, as there is a theory that one of the factors which led to the demise of OS/2 was precisely its ability to run Windows (3.1) applications.

    Of course, everybody agrees that IBM's attitude did not help, to say the least. But the lack of native OS/2 applications can also be explained by the fact that software developers could target the DOS and Win16 platforms, and also have some OS/2 market share...

    Now, OS/2 did not have a strong open-source movement behind it. Nevertheless, couldn't a good WINE make Win32 the de facto standard platform for PC software, and eventually make the OS's it runs on targets for the Microsoft change-the-API tactic, as they did with Windows3.1, 3.11, win32s1.1, 1.25 and 1.30?

  4. Re:Direct X and Driver Issues... by gavriels · · Score: 5

    The Direct3D support lives on top of OpenGL. It can actually use information about what the OpenGL/hardware combination supports to report capabilities to DirectX.

    If you're skeptical of performance, check out the 3DMark screenshots. 8-)

    Our major performance bottleneck right now is in sending geometry to the hardware. D3D has an API that lets you store geometry directly in video memory. OpenGL can do this, but only with some NVIDIA specific extensions that aren't 100% up to snuff on Linux yet. Once we get past that hurdle, we should be close to 1:1 with Windows performance.

    -Gav