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VIA Releases 16K-Line FOSS Framebuffer Driver

Posted by kdawson on from the can-only-get-better-from-here dept.

billybob2 writes "VIA has released 16,434 Lines Of Free & Open Source code that enables Linux natively to use the framebuffer on VIA's graphics chipsets. This comes a month after VIA announced that it will provide Open-Source drivers and documentation on its Web site so that its hardware will work out of the box with Linux distributions. This gives VIA-powered systems that come pre-installed with Linux — such as the gPC, 15.4" gBook, CloudBook, and Zonbu — the ability to output graphics through digital connections such as HDMI, and probably makes them the best-supported framebuffers Linux has ever had. Look forward to documentation and X.org drivers from VIA as well in the near future."

3 of 159 comments (clear)

  1. Zombu? by niteice · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    Am I the only one that read Zombu as Zombo?

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  2. Patents and driver signing requirements by tepples · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    So long as the community supports the driver well enough, why should we care? Two reasons. For one thing, H.264 is patented. So VIA needs to support the decoder, even if only by acting as a patent sublicensor to the community. In addition, Windows Vista 64-bit requires that all drivers that include a kernel-mode component be published by an established company, or the operating system will display unhideable "Test mode" banners in the four corners of the screen.
    1. Re:Patents and driver signing requirements by Darkness404 · · Score: 0, Offtopic

      In addition, Windows Vista 64-bit requires that all drivers that include a kernel-mode component be published by an established company, or the operating system will display unhideable "Test mode" banners in the four corners of the screen.

      So in other words it is a MS problem? It would have nothing to do with VIA supporting or not supporting the graphics card, it is a Windows problem and MS could fix it (though, given how broken most other parts of their OS is, I doubt that they would).

      As for the patents, they don't apply to some parts of the world so distros such as Ubuntu would include the drivers anyways, though it would be a pain it would be do-able.

      Now it would be nice for VIA to support the drivers, but if not, its not the end of the world.
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