Better Looking Linux: Tungsten Graphics

Several folks have e-mailed about the formation of Tungsten Graphics, which is composed of quite a number of ex-Precision Insighters. Linuxgames is carrying a bit of a conversation with Frank LaMonica, the CEO of the new company. They've got a contract with Red Hat already in place. Frank's statement summarizes what they are doing well: "The work we are doing involves Mesa ^? and XFree86, including both 2D and 3D multi-screen technology, and we are working very closely with the OpenGL ^? ARB to maintain the integrity of the OpenGL API. We believe that OpenGL 2.0 needs more industry support, so we are working to help generate that support. DRI ^? technology is still in its infancy, and TG plans to help bring it to full fruition. Our first step in that goal is to significantly improve the existing open source DRI driver for the Radeon chipset. That driver is tentatively scheduled for release in late spring or early summer of 2002. "

Comments

Graphics expertise and their website

[awgy]

Its not that their website doesn't serve its purpose, but the Tungsten Graphics site doesn't quite instill any security in my mind of their graphics experience. Granted, hardware and DRI-related issues generally don't require good graphical design, but someone should at least offer them a logo.

Re:Graphics expertise and their website

[randumb_surfer]

After looking at your site I don't think they'll be coming to you for site design assistance.

Re:Graphics expertise and their website

[Quizme2000]

Maybe they changed their website to a more slashdotting compatabile design. They are also dealing with alot of different browsers hitting their site. Hey its simple, fast, and IMHO suited very well for its purpose. Hell I bet its valid html code. If you want bloat, fancy graphics, and bandwidth hogging webpages please go here.

Re:Graphics expertise and their website

[ptrourke]

You lose that bet. It's (probably hand-encoded) HTML3.2, but with empty alt attributes, and a number of other validity problems (a lot of them merely typos). Not well formed, either. Looks to me like it's a placeholder written by someone who has the skills but lacks the time. Expect something better to pop up eventually. See for yourself: http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http://www.tungs tengraphics.com/

Re:Graphics expertise and their website

[Anonymous Coward]

Have you noticed most engineering firms have crappy website? They're engineers for god's sake, not some unemployed slacking web-designers.

Re:Graphics expertise and their website

[Quizme2000]

I too went a checked it out on the HTML validy tool. But then I went and checked my own webpage too. Ouch. Anywahy, working for a startup that hasn't been funding with millions of dollars, the website is a very low priority for non-internet related technologies.

Re:Graphics expertise and their website

[Merlin42]

To me it looks like they just took the PI site and simplified quite a bit.

Re:Graphics expertise and their website

[Jobe_br]

Contrary to what others are writing, I agree with this poster. Regardless of if you're intending to be working with graphics or not, if you intend to be taken seriously, a design is essential. A simple 2-3 page site (which is what it looks like they currently have) plus maybe a released template that they can use to add their own pages later doesn't have to cost $20K.

Creating sites that load quickly (for the target audience), are most compatible across browsers (including text console apps such as Lynx, if desired) and are low-load for the server (to sustain a slashdot effect) are what professional interactive agencies are called on to do. My company (shameless plug) answers that call and answers it well (say what you will about our own site, which doesn't get nearly as much time invested in it as our client's sites do).

For something like Tungsten, I'd say that having a page that loads in Lynx isn't nearly as important as having a page that looks professional and inspires trust in this brand new company. And while many, many slashdotters will be going to their site from Linux workstations using Mozilla, Galeon, Konqueror, or Opera, the visits that probably matter most to the executives at the moment are those coming in on IE, from other executives sitting in plush offices with money to invest!

Re:Graphics expertise and their website

[ptrourke]

I too went a checked it out on the HTML validy tool. But then I went and checked my own webpage too. Ouch. Anywahy, working for a startup that hasn't been funding with millions of dollars, the website is a very low priority for non-internet related technologies.

Exactly. I find validity problems on my personal pages all the time - even occasionally on the pages I do for a living. But I've had years to refine those pages, and that's what they pay me for. I can't blame a startup that doesn't want to add a web developer to their startup costs, and I can't blame an engineer who's only got 3 hours to put up a site for the company if the pages are a little ugly.

Swordfish

[pimpinmonk]

The work we are doing involves Mesa? and XFree86, including both 2D and 3D multi-screen technology

If this means they can make me something similar to that [fake] multi-screen, 2D and 3D GUI in Swordfish, I will be the happiest person ever. Although I love blackbox, I would like something a little more "advanced"...

Isn't the abbreviation wrong?

[kawlyn]

On the web page it's TG, but shouldn't it be WG?

Re:Isn't the abbreviation wrong?

[rlowe69]

>> On the web page it's TG, but shouldn't it be WG?

>wang grabbing?
>wookie grease?
>womanly grunts?

*sigh* ... W is the chemical symbol for the element Tungsten - incidentally, the W stands for wolfram. Don't they teach basic chemistry in high school these days? Maybe I'm just biting a troll ...

Re:Isn't the abbreviation wrong?

[Webmoth]

wanting goatse?

(sorry... it had to be said)

Here is to wishing..

[Erasei]

We believe that OpenGL 2.0 needs more industry support

I would +love+ to see this happen, especially in the gaming area. I know we (the /. readers and karma whores like myself) all talk about how great Linux is, and for the most part, I agree. I would not replace my Slackware server for any version of Windows, ever. But I still run a Windows desktop, purely for gaming. That is really all I do on my home desktop, is play games. I would love to be able to play those same games on a *nix machine.

Then maybe I wouldn't feel slightly guilty for pirating windows.. naaah.. I don't feel guilty.

I realize that this article was covering far more than just games.. but I know games are what we are all thinking when we hear the terms 'OpenGL' and '3D'.

Re:Here is to wishing..

[FortKnox]

The only way for Linux to become a gaming platform, is for a company to release a game on linux only, then doing some marketing and make a playable demo on Windows to get players enticed about it. I almost went out and bought a PS2, when I first played the "Oni" demo. What changed my mind? They released it on windows.

The likely-hood of this happening, is slim, seeing that you can make more money on Windows. But it may work if a buncha hobbiests get together (can't be open source, cause someone will just make a windows port)...
Heh... my idea comes down to proprietary software... go figure...

Re:Here is to wishing..

[Comrade Pikachu]

Gaming? Naah...not I.

Some of us actually use this stuff for work. I speak of animators, modelers, chemists and mathematicians. The entertainment industry (3D animation for film, television, and those games you enjoy) is extremely competitive. Thanks to the legacy of IRIX, there is a solid Unix culture there. This is the one area where Linux on the desktop has a serious competitive advantage!

Re:Here is to wishing..

[Tower]

> I almost went out and bought a PS2, when I first played the "Oni" demo. What changed my mind? They released it on windows.

This is also the reason that I haven't purchased a game console since the Sega Genesis... Especially since I tend to stick to sports games (and a few multiplayer RTSs). When the same sports game is available for a PC and a console, the price for the PC is significantly less, and you can get roster updates and game patches *far* more easily on the PC (sometimes not at all for the console) - well, the decision is already made...

Re:Here is to wishing..

[PotatoHead]

Oh yeah. Someone rumored that some big SGI names are involved. This can only be a good thing. Graphics on an IRIX box are great compared to the other UNIXes.

Re:Here is to wishing..

[geekster]

I had this attitude once. To only release my games for linux (not that they are gonna pull over any gamers, even if I finish one). But then I realized what it is I like most about Linux. It's the choice and freedom.

For me this would go against what we're fighting for. But yeah, there's a chance it'd work. It would take more than a couple of exclusive games though.

Re:Here is to wishing..

[BitwizeGHC]

The problem is, Direct3D has the game market about sewn up. Except for those holdouts over at id, the PC game industry has pretty much standardized on Direct3d version X.Y (whatever it is this week). We may have bought OpenGL some time but in a few years I see Fahrenheit repeating itself where OpenGL is subsumed entirely as a "legacy" layer on top of Direct3D, especially as the game market pulls more clout in the overall 3D scene.

OSS Radeon Drivers.

[reaper20]

Thanks guys, we all know we can't rely on ATI for decent drivers - for anything. Heh.

advertisement?

[mrroot]

Is this an advertisement for Tungsten Graphics? I mean, what is the story here? OK, so they are a consulting company who specialzes in graphics. Got it.

Re:advertisement?

[cduffy]

The formation of a new company specializing in some aspect of open source that affects people (like video device support!) is news. Further, since those of us who've been around a while know the people involved (like Brian Paul), it's interesting to know that our friends (acquaintances, whatever) have found New And Interesting work.

Will graphics be getting closer kernel ties?

[Flarners]

I've gotten the impression that the reason many cards (including my Matrox G400) underperform in Linux compared to Windows is due to the fact that the majority of the 3D talk is done in userspace, outside of the kernel. NVidia has chosen to completely bypass DRI and throw their entire driver into the kernel, which produces equal or better performance in Linux compared to Windows, at the expense of numerous stability problems (especially on multiprocessor boxes).

So, what I'd like to know is, is there a happy medium between userspace code in the X server and driver code in the kernel than can provide adequate performance without sacrificing stability? Right now, Linux 3D support is at either one end of the spectrum or the other: Stable yet slow DRI, or unstable yet blazingly fast kernel drivers. I would love to dump Windows for all my Unreal Tournament and Tribes 2 gaming needs, and am a loyal Loki customer, but I hate having to put up with either regular crashes or a large drop in performance. Hopefully, these Tungsten folk will find the best compromise.

Re:Will graphics be getting closer kernel ties?

[BlueGecko]

IIRC, BeOS's video drivers were in user space, and seeing as that was a media OS, I'm assuming that there's some merit to keeping such drivers out of the kernel. The trick more likely has to do with the fact that Linux lacks real-time scheduling and the extremely low-cost context switches that were absolutely essential on an OS so pervasively threaded as Be, so I honestly do not know if such a solution would be practical in Linux without a major rewrite of the scheduler, etc.

Re:Will graphics be getting closer kernel ties?

[cpeterso]

A major rewrite of the scheduler is planned for every new Linux kernel. Plus a rewrite of the VM, NFS, SCSI, VFS layer. Linux is getting greater all the time. That's why they have to keep rewriting it.

The NT kernel has not changed much since NT 3.51 in the earlier 90s, yet Linux is still losing benchmarks against NT.

Re:Will graphics be getting closer kernel ties?

[BillWhite]

FWIW, both the 3Dfx and ATI OpenGL Windows drivers were in user space in Windows. The way it works there is that the driver asks the 2D display driver for a memory buffer, the driver fills the memory buffer in with commands, most of which have the form "draw a triangle", and then the driver submits the buffer of commands to the hardware through a kernel interface. This is the way the ATI Rage128 drivers worked, and the 3Dfx V3 and V5 drivers worked. In fact, for OpenGL, you could use the Visual C++ debugger to debug the driver. DirectX is under the Win32 mutex, so debugging it is a big PITA, and required SoftICE.

My guess would be that they are exactly the same now. The problem with Linux performance is not that the driver is in user space, but that the driver, Mesa, is not very efficient.

Re:Will graphics be getting closer kernel ties?

[be-fan]

*Very* off-base. NVIDIA's drivers are regular GLX modules loaded by the X server in userspace. They simply use a different (but functionally equivilant in terms of protection) scheme than DRI to bang registers and interrupts on the card. The stability issues are due to other problems (to be fair, though, I have been using them for a long time and Galeon and AbiWord have crashed numerous times while the NVIDIA drivers have never frozen the kernel or even X).

Re:Will graphics be getting closer kernel ties?

[be-fan]

Actually, BeOS splits up the video drivers. The low level work that *has* to be done in the kernel (like handling interrupts) is done in kernel space. The high level work (everything else, including drawing) is done by the X server (from userspace) directly manipulating the registers on the card. This is actually faster than putting the driver in the kernel because you don't have to make a slow system call to do drawing. The major bottleneck in the system is that you have to communicate between the X server and the application.
Ideally, processors would implement protection mechanisms similar to the x86 segmentation method. That method let you define 4 protection rings, and allowed code to access certain segments based on the privelege level of the segment containing the code. That way, everything could be done in the application. The app code would have a privlege level of 3, so it couldn't trash kernel or windowing system data. The window system would have a privelege level of 1 or 2, so it could access its data and the applications, but couldn't trash kernel data. The kernel would have a privelege of 0, so it could access anything and be safe from other code. Using such a mechanism, it would be possible to make everything (including windowing operations and system calls) require no more time than a simple function call.

Re:Will graphics be getting closer kernel ties?

[Mr. Shiny And New]

Gee... according to Linus the scheduler has never been rewritten, and the scheduler is performing just fine. Some people complain that it could do better on large multi-processor boxes, but then NT doesn't do so well on those boxes either.

Also, NT4 had some major changes in that the video drivers were moved INTO the kernel.

Re:Will graphics be getting closer kernel ties?

[be-fan]

First, it does have an X server port. Second, it has the app_server, which does essentially the same thing.

And they do what again????

[rhost89]

If their web site is any indication of their graphical prowass, then be afraid....be very afraid.

Re:And they do what again????

[technomancerX]

And designing a website has what to do with writing drivers for video cards???

This sounds promising...

[Krapangor]

but without "compatibility" to standard of the beast, don't call it's name, "DirectX", we won't see much games ported.
Loki hadn't great business success and most major game companies will refrain from porting to linux as long this needs expensive porting. The profit margins aren't that big in the gaming industry. The linux desktop community is not big enough to justify larger investments.

Not very supportive of Open source

[A Commentor]

We believe that some code MUST be open source, other code can go either way, and some, especially at the lowest levels of hardware and the code within applications, can be completely closed with no loss of benefit to the industry or its customers.

Didn't we have to face this problem before with some of the video card (S3?) manufactures that refused to give out programming information... Code to control hardware should be open just like any of the other code.

Re:Not very supportive of Open source

[Transient0]

i must admit that statement seemd rather odd to me as well. It's true that depending on the application the benefits to be gained from opening the source can be greater or lesser. But there is no code that can be completely closed without some loss of benefit to the industry and customer.

At the very least you have to acknowledge that your code may be buggy and that there may be a user who would like to fix the bug themselves for personal use. This can happen at ANY level of code.

This statement is a little ominous, it seems to foreshadow a possible intention of further developing some current open source graphics code and perhaps closing it at a later date... something to keep an eye out for.

Re:Not very supportive of Open source

[MisterBlister]

The more open code, the better; but expecting low-level hardware programming info and specs these days is kind of naive. Hardware companies are IP-mad and increasingly unwilling to publish any of this information. Until someone comes up with some viable means of "Free (as in speech) Hardware", which is pretty unlikely as most of us don't have our own chip foundries in-house, its just going to get worse and worse.

The real world options are: #1, use very old hardware, with published specs; #2, concede that extremely low-level stuff like device drivers might have to be closed source and learn to work around that while keeping as much code as we possibly can Open; #3, stick head in sand.

Re:Not very supportive of Open source

[MrHat]

Nice find - they have this completely reversed.

People should *demand* that code closest to the hardware is open source. Look at it this way: a company collapses and takes with it a base of code. Would you rather it be a driver at the core of your display subsystem, or your text editor? One product has alternatives that don't render your existing hardware useless.

Did you buy into the Circuit City Divx thing? No? Then you shouldn't go for this kind of crap either. Companies that get my money are the ones that aren't afraid of full disclosure.

IIRC, a similar issue with print drivers was the driving force in the establishment of the GNU project.

Re:Not very supportive of Open source

[MadAhab]

There is one way, and only one way, to completely close code with no loss to the customers, and that is to put that code in hardware and have open specs for interacting with it.

Anything else means that you can be stranded by the vendor.

Re:Not very supportive of Open source

[CrazyBrett]

But there is no code that can be completely closed without some loss of benefit to the industry and customer.

Hmm... let me see if I can refute this. While the "open source is always better" philosophy works well at the application layer, it seems to break down as you get lower and lower in the system.

The omnipresent consequence of open source is multiple incarnations of the same basic functionality. Indeed, this is touted as one of the benefits of open source; you can change the code to add new features or fix bugs. But it becomes a penalty whenever someone has to interoperate with that piece of code. This is why we have elaborate configure scripts, even for portability to the same OS. Now imagine if everyone wrote their own video drivers! Remember the days when games had to include drivers for every device they intended to support? This would be an undertaking of the same magnitude, as applications would need to include special code to interface with every driver they wanted to support.

At such a low level, I'd argue that open source practices might cause more harm than good. Common interfaces are generally a very good thing.

-- Brett

Re:Not very supportive of Open source

[4of12]

...code in hardware and have open specs for interacting with it.

Yessir.

I've often said the same:

• open up and describe fully the interface.
• go ahead, tweak and tune your proprietary black box implementation

Re:Not very supportive of Open source

[ClosedSource]

"open up and describe fully the interface.

go ahead, tweak and tune your proprietary black box implementation"

I agree, but I think this argument can also apply to APIs and other higher-level SW interfaces. I'd rather a fully described API without source code then a poorly documented API with source code. You can learn a lot looking at source but it's not always the most efficient method of getting your work done.

Re:Not very supportive of Open source

[damiam]

And since when can open source software not provide a common interface?

Re:Not very supportive of Open source

[Ogerman]

It'd be nice, but we don't need "Free Hardware" as a prerequisite for open source drivers. It's more a problem of misunderstanding of braindead management who don't realize that the only thing of possible value to their competitors is in the silicon itself. Open Source or not, driver software is pretty easy to reverse engineer.

If these people are going to write closed source ATI drivers, I'm not interested. They want me to stick untrusted binaries into the kernel? Forget it! Sounds like another bunch of traitors who weren't innovative enough to devise an Open Source business model. Oh well, we can always reverse engineer their drivers can't we?

Re:Not very supportive of Open source

[4of12]

Yes, I, too, would rather have a fully-described API w/o src than a poorly-documented API w/ src.

But your point got me to thinking about how 98% of the APIs are insufficiently documented, to the point where the ugly necessity of looking at someone else's source is often the only recourse.

And the standard for "fully-described" is high.

Frequently the exposed API will intimate that X is how you do some particular task, but the implementation is so sucky that doing W, Y, and Z turns out to be practically better from the standpoint of performance, memory, complexity, etc.

Imporving the Radeon driver...

[wbattestilli]

Would be great!!!

I would really love to buy a radeon for my Linux workstation, but nVidia provides superior dirvers. I would like to philosophically take a stand and reject nVidia for their refusal to release specs but I need complete and efficient drivers. The radeon currently cannot compete with nVidia on linux (or windows) even though the radeon is likely better hardware.

Re:Imporving the Radeon driver...

[xigshill]

Ahh, but it can ;-) The 7500 is about as fast as the GeForce 3 Ti 500 under linux, and the 8500 will be even faster... See: http://www.xig.com/Pages/Atop/CardIndividualSuppor tSpec/ATI-IndividualCards/Radeon7500.html -jon

Expect impressive products

[KnightStalker]

... whatever they might be. You can't complain about a development team that includes the guy in charge of XFree86 *and* the developer of Mesa. This could definitely lead to some cool software :-)

3D-X

[Transient0]

An interesting idea. Any true 3D Desktop/Window Manager would of course be a hugely unnecessary memory and processing hog and most practical users would not be interested.

But still... if this research project will lead to more advanced and more closely integrated OpenGL, than a 3D windows manager may become practical on higher end machines. It may still just be a toy, but it would be a really pretty toy. Things like that, sad to say, are the sort of things that might start winning more of the home market over to linux(not to mention the advanced game support that is sure to come with independent openGL development and research).

BOB: Check out Quake version "n" running on my windows box!
FRED: yeah, that's pretty cool, but here's Quake version "n" running on my Linux box(faster i might add) and check out how COOL my desktop is.

Is either one that bad for you?

[cduffy]

What's your box? I've had zilch stability problems on my machine running nvidia's GeForce 3 drivers (admittedly, it's a uniprocessor box), and before I switched to this card from a Voodoo 3 I found the performance difference between Linux and Windows reasonable even when noticable. (On the other hand, I'm fully aware of the Matrox performance not being all that hot... presuming that was the drivers rather than the card; when I had a G200 I didn't have any Windows install)

I've seen friends' boxen be unstable with nvidia's drivers, which causes me to suspect that it varies somewhat with the motherboard in use.

This raises two questions:

1. Is your motherboard one of those against which the GeForce drivers are unstable?

2. Is your video card one of those against which the DRI-backed performance isn't up to par?

I suppose it'd be possible to rig a system to count context switches drivers leaning more heavily on userspace code and with Nvidia's and see if the difference between kernel and userspace is the real hangup; my suspicion is that it's not.

Re:Is either one that bad for you?

[cduffy]

why would someone buy a nice card and then waste it's features in linux? It's not like you can play any games properly in it!

Beg pardon -- playing Tribes 2 at 1600x1200 with a perceptibly perfect framerate is somehow improper?

Marketing fluff.

[Xenopax]

Why did this even get onto slashdot? All this company has right now is a bunch of marketing fluff. For example:

As major contributors to three standard graphics initiatives (XFree86, Mesa/OpenGL, DRI), we are in a unique position to assure our clients that any development we participate in will integrate seamlessly with all major Linux distributions.

Unique position!?!?!?! Integrate seamlessly!?!?!?! OpenGL!?!?!?! XFree86!?!?!?! Holy crap, where do I sign? Reading though thier site I couldn't find any useful information, just a bunch of marketing material. Why do companies like this get onto slashdot when the only thing they have done is master the art of throwing around buzz-words (or did I answer my own question...)

Radeon?

[tempest303]

I wonder what they mean by the "Radeon chipset"? Is this just for the "classic" Radeons, or for the new 7500/8500 series? While I've got a legacy Radeon, I really hope the support is for the new series - I'd love to see cutting edge cards like the Radeon 8500 get the support it deserves in Linux, and I'd pay for the privilege. (You listening, ATI? :)

Re:Radeon?

[chris_oat]

i you're willing to pay, then you can buy the firegl/radeon8800 card. this has all the features of the r8500 and comes with excellent linux drivers.

Sheesh....lame industry naming trends.

[Bowie J. Poag]

What, was "Wolfram Graphics" taken?

Re:Sheesh....lame industry naming trends.

[Mindjiver]

Im gonna be labedled a troll here. But...

Stop bashing these guys! Atleast they are doing some newsworthy unlike you! Why not make some good tiles for you damn site instead of trolling slashdot and making lame comments. Just stop or go away, please.

Re:Sheesh....lame industry naming trends.

[Bowie J. Poag]

Every time someone whines, "Go make more tiles for us, Bowie!" i'm that much less inclined to actually do so.

Despite apperances to the contrary, I have a sense of humor. My comment wasnt meant as a "slam" of their efforts, but I do appreciate you expecting the worst from me, that oh-so-evil guy who pissed you off a year ago when I flipped VA the bird and walked away. Well, guess what. Everyone else did the same thing a month ago. Go label them pariahs. I'll foot the bill for the ink.

In the meantime, cool down and wise up. It wont hurt, I promise.

Re:Sheesh....lame industry naming trends.

[joib]

Well, maybe it was too close to "Wolfram Research", the company behind Mathematica.

Look out nvidia.

[Penguinoflight]

With the Radeon 7500 (the one with the technical stuff to smash a geforce 3), nvidia will likely see a loss in it's sales to linux users. The Radeon 7500 is actually a radeon 64mb ddr that goes a lot faster. The radeon 8500 on the other hand is another generation, too bad it's not supported yet.

To be frank, if it weren't for the heat that nvidia cards produce, I'd probably get one. I just can't afford to have my server go down because a GPU overheated and pumped the case tempurature to 120 degrees. I don't want a video card that has a fan for something other than cosmetics.

Re:Look out nvidia.

[tweek]

What in the hell do you need a card like that in a SERVER for? Buy the cheapest agp or pci card you can find and stick it in there.

If you have a server that's doing more than serving, you shouldn't be running one.

Re:Look out nvidia.

[Xoro]

First, I agree with what the above poster says about the card in your server. If you don't just decide on price, the only shopping point is 2d driver stability.

Second, if it's more of a home server++ thing, the Geforce 2 MX 200 has decent 3d performance with only 4w heat dissapation. If you need maximum 3d performance in your (ahem) server, the GF3 is only 15 watts. The extra 10 watts can be easily made up by chosing your hard disks carfully, adding a case fan, etc. Unless this ultra-stable mission critical server is also running a pair of overclocked XPs...

Re:Look out nvidia.

[ArsonSmith]

What if it is an X Server????? X Servers do need good graphics cards in them to be any good.

Re:Look out nvidia.

[Kaa]

To be frank, if it weren't for the heat that nvidia cards produce, I'd probably get one. I just can't afford to have my server go down because a GPU overheated and pumped the case tempurature to 120 degrees

Just what kind of a server do you have? GeForce cards have a single purpose in life, and that is to run 3D games. Period.

If you are running what we usually call a server (you know, the one that cannot go down), why in the world would you need a GeForce in it? And if it's a gaming machine, it CAN go down. Maybe you don't think so, but trust me, it won't crash that strange thing we call reality. ;-)

This technology has been around for years!

[Carrion]

Tungsten graphics is usually low resolution, about 0.25 DPI. It's also got high power consumption and therefore heat dissipation, around 25-90W/pixel. If you want colour, triple those numbers. You wouldn't want one of these displays on your workstation, believe me!
Still, it's often used due to it's scaleability; I've seen dozens of companies use them in the major cities, ever since I was a kid.
Slashdot is behind it's times, posting articles of old technologies, well-known in the advertising business!

For those more interested in the technology, each pixel is made out of a usually pear shaped glass bubble. A tungsten spool is inserted, and the air is removed from the bubble causing a vacuum. When electricity is sent through the spool it starts glowing brightly so that light is emitted. The absence of oxygen from the vacuum keeps the tungsten from oxidating, making it last much longer. By variating the current through the spool, you can increase or decrease the brightness of the pixel.

Re:This technology has been around for years!

[MisterBlister]

At first i kind of assumed this was a joke, but then I read the whole thing and if it is a joke, there's no funny to be found in it.

Was it meant as a joke, or have readers not only stopped reading the articles referenced, but the Slashdot writeups as well?

Are people just reading the HEADLINE and then posting these days?

Sheesh.

Re:This technology has been around for years!

[Tower]

It would have been funnier without the last paragraph... sort of the "explaining the joke makes it no longer funny" syndrome.

Up until then, it was amusing...

Re:This technology has been around for years!

[JabberWokky]

Subtle, tongue in cheek, overdrawn humor is lost on you then. The funniest aspect of this post is not the post itself, but that it got moderated up as "Interesting", meaning that some idiot out there with moderation points bought it.

--
Evan

Re:This technology has been around for years!

[BitterOak]

Isn't this exactly how a light bulb works? If so, how is tungsten graphics different from a conventional incandescent light bulb?

Re:This technology has been around for years!

[spitzak]

Static displays of arbitrary shape and complexity can be created using off-the-shelf components. These are very popular for Christmas decorations on the exteriors of houses.

Re:This technology has been around for years!

[Tower]

>Subtle, tongue in cheek, overdrawn humor is lost on you then
Well, I usually catch the subtle, tongue in cheek stuff, but the overdrawn stuff just makes me weary :)

The fact that an "Interesting" was wasted on that is a little more sad than anything...

Too many levels of Meta-Meta-humor, I suppose... it'll be great when someone M2s the "Interesting" as "Fair" - what a hoot ;)

Re:We've been waiting

[MisterBlister]

This is great news, finally OpenGL will gain some ground...

I'll believe it when I see it. I don't mean to be flamey or rain on anyone's parade, but as a 3D programmer I've been hearing how great OpenGL 2.0, OpenML, etc will be..

I've read specs, read committee meeting discussions ad naseum; but I still don't have any API to program to or even what looks like the beginnings of consenseus among the ARB members.

In the meantime Microsoft is going fullsteam ahead with Direct3D (and the rest of DX) 9, adding in the latest features, fixing the last remaining issues with DX8 (don't kid yourself, its a great API; if anyone quotes Carmack's 5 year old .plan I will kill their mother).

Meanwhile, if I choose to use OpenGL I'm stuck with vendors who implement things different (yes, there are benefits to OpenGL's open extention architecture, but only if the vendors play nice, which they haven't been..), no standard for shading languages (until OpenGL 2.0..and considering how long it took OpenGL 1.2 to be well supported over OpenGL 1.1 I wouldn't hold my breath and fuck you ATI, for lagging on implementing NV's shading extentions and forcing coders to write to two seperate interfaces!), etc, etc.

Sometimes a strong authority is better than a committe, and this is one of those situations, IMO.

Re:Unoriginal name...

[ghamerly]

Wolfram Research is named after its founder, Stephen Wolfram, not for the element Tungsten. See this site. So "Tungsten Graphics" isn't copying anything here.

2D performance of current Radeon drivers is awful

[Thagg]

The current DRI Radeon drivers are fine for 3D, providing pretty much the full power of the machine to the Linux world -- but the 2D performance is awful. Why, you might ask? Because when ATI contracted with VA Linux to create the drivers, they only funded development of 3D, and didn't specify that the 2D performance should be accelerated.

This turns out to be a real problem in the visual effects community -- a lot of our work depends on having good, fast 2D. Film frames, after all, are still just 2D images.

I hope that this new driver they speak of, and future drivers, recognize this. We'll see. At this point, we have to by nVidia boards, even while the drivers are closed-source, they provide pretty good 2D support.

thad

Precision Insight

[4of12]

Am I correct in my impression that Precision Insight included some of the more famous names from SGI and that some of these same people would be part of Tungsten Graphics?

Re:Precision Insight

[4of12]

no..
thats nvidia

My mistake. My apologies.

Maybe that talent pool has something to do with nvidia's successes in the market, although I would not discount the importance of intelligent management, either.

What the hell is he talking about?

[waldoj]

The work we are doing involves Mesa? and XFree86, including both 2D and 3D multi-screen technology, and we are working very closely with the OpenGL? ARB to maintain the integrity of the OpenGL API. We believe that OpenGL 2.0 needs more industry support, so we are working to help generate that support. DRI? technology is still in its infancy, and TG plans to help bring it to full fruition. Our first step in that goal is to significantly improve the existing open source DRI driver for the Radeon chipset. That driver is tentatively scheduled for release in late spring or early summer of 2002.

I'm no moron. I own a handful of computers, Mac and Linux, I've built a few dozen machines in my time, and I managed to configure X on them when necessary. That said, what the hell does this mean?

Really. I'm asking.

-Waldo Jaquith

Re:What the hell is he talking about?

[MrHat]

It means they're building more shiny things.

Re:What the hell is he talking about?

[talonyx]

The work we are doing involves Mesa? and XFree86, including both 2D and 3D multi-screen technology, and we are working very closely with the OpenGL? ARB to maintain the integrity of the OpenGL API.

-- Mesa is an OpenGL compatible 3D API. Xfree86 is a free version of the X Windowing System.
Multi-screen technology is when two video cards (or one, with DualHead) and two screens are tied together on the same desktop.
The statements about OpenGL simply mean Tungsten is going to make sure their products remain compatible with OpenGL.

We believe that OpenGL 2.0 needs more industry support, so we are working to help generate that support.

---This is pretty clear; the almost-industry-standard OpenGL is being updated to version 2.0 very slowly, and Tungsten is going to try to get this in gear.

DRI? technology is still in its infancy, and TG plans to help bring it to full fruition.

--DRI = Direct Rendering Infrastructure, Xfree86 4.0+'s method of allowing programs to render directly to hardware acceleration, with fewer API layers and bagges.

Our first step in that goal is to significantly improve the existing open source DRI driver for the Radeon chipset. That driver is tentatively scheduled for release in late spring or early summer of 2002.

-- They want to fix the drivers. :D

Re:What the hell is he talking about?

[Chris Pimlott]

You're missing the point. They use a bunch of graphics buzzwords and technologies but they don't actually say what they are doing. I don't think the original poster was confused about the technologies themselves.

Re:What the hell is he talking about?

[waldoj]

I don't think the original poster was confused about the technologies themselves.

Actually, I really was confused. I mean, I agree with you that it's ridiculous that their statement was so buzzword-laden, but I really and truly didn't understand what they were talking about. My thanks for the translation. :)

-Waldo Jaquith

Who these guys are

[kingdon]

I'll agree that the website or the other linked material don't really go beyond the fluff, so let me try to explain why this matters. Frank and most of the other people involved in this have been going to the Linux shows and writing XFree86 drivers for Red Hat and stuff like that since at least, well, 1996 or so (probably longer). Then the Linux Hype Effect sucked them into VA Linux and spat them out the other side (hopefully it had its rewards, although I don't know how much stock they got or when/whether they sold it). Now they are going back to their roots - a small technically oriented company. I expect to see more of this - lots of good companies went through much upheaval in the days of the Linux Hype Effect and so now we should see things realigning in a more stable, sustainable configuration.

Better Graphics support not better looking

[vtechpilot]

I don't care how good the graphics libraries are, Linux apps will still be Butt-Ugly as long as developers (myself included - Kylix Yea!) continue writing Butt-Ugly apps.

Then again I've made some damn ugly Windows apps too.

Re:Used ATI in the last year?

[swright]

Gald you've had so much luck.... here;'s a short summary of my problems....

- most DVDs skip with 30 second pauses every 5 minutes.

- every time I upgrade the drivers DVDs won't play AT ALL (entire computer locks up hard on play)

- TV pausing/playing/recording; great quality but randomly hangs, randomly stalls picture and plays only sound, randomly goes into a 30frameorso loop for ever...

it's fine for gaming mind, just shite for all the things that I actually bought the card for (its a Radeon All-In-Wonder btw)

Re:Here is to wishing.. (amen!)

[PotatoHead]

OpenGL is not just about games, though I play them along with everyone else :)

Mcad, Scientific Vis. , Simulation are some applications that depend on OpenGL right now. There is a *lot* of pressure to move some of these to the win32 graphics API to gain the economics of scale that surround the Intel platform.

In the MCAD area, OpenGL is widely used because the big players are still cross platform. Over the last few years, there has been little real Linux interest, and little UNIX interest. Almost every one starting new with MCAD was starting on win32.

This year has been different. People are asking about MCAD on Linux and UNIX. Seems that some of the backlash we all have postulated about here is beginning to happen. (about goddam time!)

One interesting approach has been to put in win32 MCAD because it is cheaper than UNIX, maybe use a UNIX backend and hope to migrate to Linux when things come together in the near future. Hearing this stuff is huge and indicates to me that Tungsten is in the right place at the right time.

Good quality X servers can at least take advantage of back-end UNIX compute servers. Enough people do this and realize the administrative and support advantages and Linux native ports will follow.

So here's to hoping for next year. OpenOffice will continue to get capable, Linux graphics will get strong and compare more favorably to highend implementations like IRIX, and some ancillary applications will appear to make technical computing on Linux a reality outside the developer and adademic communities.

Re:Used ATI in the last year?

[ahaning]

I have a Radeon VE, and it does work very well (1600x1200@24bit and 75Hz on a Samsung 900IFT) on X 4.1.0. My main gripe is that I need to use the DVI->VGA adapter in order to use it on my CRT. I don't suppose it would be all that clearer if it was directly on the VGA, but it would be nice.

I guess it's also a little slow at moving windows around opaquely in FVWM2. But I think that's a combined result of no DirectX, X just being slow (assuming DirectX is what allows Windows to move windows opaquely so well), and FVWM2 being slow at moving windows opaquely (BlackBox and WindowMaker are speedier).

Other than that, 2D is pretty good and GL apps run really well. Maybe not as well as they could, but acceptably well.

Forget better looking linux, how about...

[47Ronin]

Beautiful BSD in a glowing blue box! Yes, Mac OSX in a modified case...

http://www.kentsalas.com/blueiceG4/p5.asp

Re:Used ATI in the last year?

[swright]

yeah? the PSU in that box (PII 400, 1 hard drive, 1 DVD drive, 1 network card) is the same rating as that in my workstation....

dual 1Ghz PIII, 3 hard drives (+1 drive cooler), CDRW, TV card, 2 x NICs).

I know PSUs differ in quality and output, but even so.....

(and why does DVD/TV use more than 3D???)

Looks pretty familiar.

[booch]

Compare these 2 web pages:

Precision Insight Team
Tungsten Graphics Team

What about people who just want a nice GUI?

[HanzoSan]

Besides specialized uses like that, the linux gui can really use some help. It cant even do transparency properly, and you can forget about genie effects.

Re:What about people who just want a nice GUI?

[vandan]

You should check out Enlightenment - both 0.16.5 and 0.17.

Radeon drivers

[j3110]

Oh great, my radeon will be obsolete by then! :) NVidia will have released SpaceHeater 4 GTS (Using the plasma state of mass to increase core temperature and power draw by another 120%. Gonna have to run a drive connector to the vidcard) Then ATI will have released something decent to try to compete, but won't have time to write the drivers for it either. Maybe the Radeon drivers will be good enough to make up the difference :)

Re:Unoriginal name...

[Junks Jerzey]

It is very difficult to tell if this person is (A) trying to be funny, or (B) really, really uptight.

Old news

[mallan]

The NVIDIA stability problems are old news. Yes, for the first 6 months they were available, they had some stability issues. Just because they stated in their README that they were having stability issues on multiprocessor boxes 18 months ago does not mean the stability issues exist today.

I only use dual processor boxes. I have a dual processor box at home, and we've got 11 dual processor Linux boxes at work. All use NVIDIA hardware, and all of them are very, very stable. Our lab does flight simulators and scientific visualization, so the machines get heavy 3D use on a daily basis. I havn't had any NVIDIA Linux box lock up in about a year.

Most of the people I've talked to who are having stability problems with the NVIDIA cards under Linux have either a cheap motherboard or an inadequate power supply. No driver in the world can compensate for either of these.

7500 is classic.

[Penguinoflight]

The 7500, impressive as it is in benchmarks is actually the same chip as the radeon "classic", only faster. The radeon 8500 on the other hand is completely different, and 2d doesn't even work with the old drivers.

Re:Used ATI in the last year?

[swright]

mm fair point - but while it may explain some of it, why would it affect DVDs intermittently (surely they spin constantly while playing - the problem affected some DVDs all the time, some some of the time and some hardly ever), and that shouldnt affect normal TV usage...

Re:We've been waiting

[Anonymous Coward]

If you want to fuck someone, fuck NVIDIA. They have offered licensing terms for NV_vertex_program that are impossible for most of the industry to accept, and have repeatedly claimed IP on all vertex programming APIs while refusing to identify what that IP is, so that the ARB and other vendors can avoid it.

NVIDIA has also engaged in a great deal of spin control and has jerked other vendors around by saying they'd changed their position and were offering the extension up without any conditions, then suddenly reversing course after work on a unified interface had been underway for months.

Their recent offer of NV_vertex_program under license to Brian Paul must be looked at very sceptically in light of their past history.

wow, big deal.

[mister_sparkle]

Wow, another "company" with a great business plan. Drivers for Linux gaming! As we are all aware, Linux has a huge share of the gaming market. I know that when my little sister wanted to get into gaming, she ran right out and grabbed a copy of Debian! After the simple, user-friendly installation, she easily configured her X server, and understood what it was about right off the bat. It was then a piece of cake for her to figure out how to use IRC, get the latest drivers for her video card in a tarball from some IRC channel, install them, and update her config file by hand. She then went to our local CompUSA, stopped by the Linux gaming section (there are so many to choose from!), and got started.

Come on, people. Who cares. Linux was never meant to be a stellar gaming system. If only you could look past your blind hatred of Microsoft and realize that Linux is never going to be the gaming platform of choice. Too bad these guys are wasting their efforts for something that really isn't going to pay off. But hey, it's on /., so it must be important!!!

Confusing

[krackbebe]

All of this changing of companies, without nary a profit in sight, is confusing to a layperson such as myself who is simply trying to create a roadmap for my IT department.

It's hard to recommend Linux when there is so much confusion in the sector. I think I'll be sticking to tried and true software, which I know I can depend to be there years into the future. Doesn't seem like Linux fits the bill at this point.

Great!

[smash]

Now I can have all 20 or so x-terms in fully openGL rendered, light-sourced 3d :P

Personally, i think trying to design a 3d user-interface is pointless until we have some sort of 3d display device (I'm thinking holographic projector of some sort)

I do hope they get accelerated OpenGL more commonplace/easy to set up though - this is currently one of *the* major things holding back linux gaming...

smash

If you find this...

[Mindjiver]

I could care less about VA and that you flipped the bird on them.. whatever that means. Im just tired of seeing you making stupid comments.. thats all.

Re:2D performance of current Radeon drivers is awf

[xigshill]

The current DRI Radeon drivers are horrible in 3D too, and don't go anywhere near taking full advantage of the hardware. I know - we've tested it: Radeon 64 benchmarks. Note: I work for Xi Graphics, an evil, closed source, Xserver company. ;-) -jon