X.Org Releases First Modular Source Roll-Up

NewsForge is reporting that X.Org has released their first modular roll-up release. From the article: "All X11R7.0 derivative ("modularized") releases divide the source code into logically distinct modules, separately developed, built, and maintained by the community of X.Org developers. This concentrates and accelerates development time, supporting continuous modification, testing, and publication of each module.The new modular format offers focused development, and rapid and independent updates and distribution of tested modular components as they are ready, freed from the biennial maintenance release timetable."

Comments

Re:Still doesn't fix

[Chris Pimlott]

That'll still help. Not having to download the entire source tarball to fix one package lowers the cost of entry for people interested in making changes.

Re:Still doesn't fix

[peragrin]

Um It's not the bandwidth, but the pile.

Which is easier to repair and inspect. A modern skyscraper or a 1000 small homes in a suburb?

given the same number of people in each team which do you think would done first and with a higher quality?

Which is easier for the less trained to be brought up to speed on?

Re:Still doesn't fix

[AKAImBatman]

Not having to download the entire source tarball to fix one package lowers the cost of entry for people interested in making changes.

Or more likely, being able to build a distribution without twm, xedit, xeyes, xman, xvfb, and the billions of other useless utilities that clog up and XWin installation could make for smaller, more focused builds that assist projects that are focused only on producing an end product. (Damn Small Linux is a good candidate in my mind.)

Previously, the X build system was so monolithic in nature that you couldn't not build all these stupid little widgets. Now that things are more modularized, you can build only what you need and throw away the rest.

Re:I, For One, Welcome Our Modular Overlairds....

[siride]

That's not the issue. The issue is that the toolkits are inefficient in their usage of the X protocol. This is partially if not totally because of the crapfest that is xlib. Xlib is so terribly inefficient and poorly designed that even the best-written toolkit will have some performance problems if it uses xlib. With XCB now getting ready to go primetime, performance with X might finally start to improve.

In other words..

[Brandybuck]

...freed from the biennial maintenance release timetable.

This is just a fancy way of saying packages will be breaking on a weekly basis.

Re:Why not scrap X

[Eric Smith]

But X can now do all the things he was talking about in that article, so nothing in that article is evidence that there's a problem with today's X.

If you just want a strawman argument that X as it existed in 2000 is not very good today, I don't think you'll get much disagreement.

Re:In other news ...

[Just Some Guy]

Since they managed to piss off almost everyone in the F/OSS community, the Changelog for XFree 4.6.0 has a lot of stuff like:

3.5.2. XFree86 core server and modules

Port of SBUS drivers to SunOS variants. This also allows for multihead using a mix of SBUS and PCI devices.

3.6.11. twm

Allow environment variables to be used in menu names.

3.6.10. xclock

Use the Xaw tooltip to display the date in xclock.

I mean, they make Debian/stable look like the very model of cutting-edge experimentation. You won't get any fancy XGL stuff, but if you need enhanced support for your Sun IPX running twm, xclock and xbiff - well, then, they're your go-to guys.

I'd like to say I wish them luck, but I don't really. They spent years doing their darnedest to alienate their talent pool and end users alike, and it wouldn't hurt my feelings to see that dog laid to rest.