AMD Open Sources Their Linux Video API

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AMD Open Sources Their Linux Video API

Posted by Roblimo on Saturday February 26, 2011 @12:42AM from the every-little-open-source-bit-helps dept.

An anonymous reader writes "AMD has open sourced X-Video Bitstream Acceleration, their API by which they expose the Universal Video Decoder 2 GPU under Linux." They may be a little late with this move, and not everything you could wish is now open source, but it's better than nothing.

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Okaaaaaay... by MrEricSir · 2011-02-26 00:51 · Score: 4, Insightful

The ATI drivers for Linux were never perfect, but they worked decently. But ATI/AMD would drop support for older chips that were still in use. The open source community never provided a shim to let these older drivers work with newer builds of X.
Does open sourcing the drivers really fix the compatibility problem? To me, not building a shim suggests a general lack of caring about ATI drivers. Do we really need the source to give a future to aging ATI/AMD chips?

--
There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
1. Re:Okaaaaaay... by PhobosK · 2011-02-26 02:15 · Score: 2
  
  Well that is too late I think... Something like using an umbrella after the rain has stopped... :)
  
  I already have a very bad experience with a couple of laptops with integrated old ATI cards which linux support was dropped by ATI 2 years after they were produced?!...
  
  So i have learned my lesson very well and it is - NEVER buy anything even closely related to ATI (though it is now AMD :) )...
  
  No one should make one and the same mistake again, shouldn't he?
2. Re:Okaaaaaay... by slash.duncan · 2011-02-26 02:50 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  Well, there's the proprietary drivers which AMD/ATI does what they want with, dropping support for old chips, etc, and there's the native xorg/kernel/mesa/drm and now KMS drivers, which are open. The open drivers support at least as far back as Mach64 and ATIRage, and while I never used those specific drivers, after I realized what a bad idea the servantware drivers were based on the nVidia card I had when I first switched to Linux, I've stuck with the Radeon native drivers. In fact, I was still using a Radeon 9200 (r2xx chip series) until about 14 months ago, when I upgraded to a Radeon hd4650 (r7xx chip series), so I /know/ how well the freedomware support lasts. =:^)
  And why would the free/libre and open source (FLOSS) folks build a shim for the servantware driver? The kernel specifically does NOT maintain an internal kernel stable ABI (the external/userland interface is a different story, they go to great lengths to maintain that stable), and if anyone's building proprietary drivers on it, it's up to them to maintain their shim between the open and closed stuff as necessary. Rather, the FLOSS folks maintain their native FLOSS drivers.
  And while for the leading edge it it's arguable that the servantware drivers are better performing and for some months may in fact be the only choice, by the time ATI's dropping driver support, the freedomware drivers tend to be quite stable and mature (altho there was a gap in the r3xx-r5xx time frame after ATI quit cooperating, before AMD bought them and started cooperating with the FLOSS folks again, part of the reason I stuck with the r2xx series so long, but those series are well covered now).
  So this /is/ good news, as it should allow the freedomware drivers to better support hardware video accel, as they merge the new information into the freedomware drivers.
  
  --
  Duncan
  "Every nonfree program has a lord, a master,
  and if you use the program, he is your master."
  R Stallman
3. Re:Okaaaaaay... by next_ghost · 2011-02-26 05:20 · Score: 2
  
  X.org and Linux kernel developers don't care about any closed source software. When somebody chooses to release software as closed source, he decides that nobody else can update it themselves. Why should open source developers make his life easier by restricting the pace of development of their own software? Open source developers didn't force him to release the software as closed source. Open source software on the other hand can be easily updated to keep up with the pace of upstream development by anybody.
  I own 3 generations of ATI hardware (Mach64/Rage 3D Pro, R200/Radeon 8500, M56/Mobility Radeon x1600) and in general, the closed source driver implements more hardware features but on the other hand, the open source driver is MUCH more stable. ATI is my graphics card brand of choice but I'd rather get Intel than deal with closed source driver again.
4. Re:Okaaaaaay... by WorBlux · 2011-02-26 08:48 · Score: 2
  
  Not neccessarily, the graphics industry is a hotbed of patent litigation waiting to happen. Open sourcing the complete driver would open up a lot of proof for attacks through the courts. Opening up any of it to open source is a huge deal, and show the continuing shift in willingness of manufacturers to work with the linux foundation to provide the best possible experience on the hardware for any potential use. ATI on just linux that's broken, it's the OpenGL support, wchich lags behind even in thier windows drivers.
5. Re:Okaaaaaay... by next_ghost · 2011-02-27 01:01 · Score: 2
  
  There is no "us vs. them" in this case. There are two software packages, one open source, the other proprietary. Why should developers of the open source package cripple their own software just to keep the proprietary one working? Developers of the propiretary one made the decision to prevent everybody else from contributing fixes and updates. If you're dissatisfied with results when they can't or don't want to keep up with changes in related open source packages, blame the proprietary developers for making wrong decisions.
this is good news by bmalia · 2011-02-26 00:53 · Score: 4, Interesting

I have always purchased nVidia cards soley because I knew that they provided linux drivers. Lately though, the drivers don't seem to work quite right. Might be getting to be about time for me to give ATI a go.

--
There's no place like ~/
1. Re:this is good news by janwedekind · 2011-02-26 04:30 · Score: 2
  
  If you don't need cutting edge graphics, give Intel Graphics a go. The drivers are free software -> distributors are permitted to integrate them properly -> installation is a breeze.
2. Re:this is good news by Knuckles · 2011-02-26 07:08 · Score: 2
  
  Intel's 3D is plenty capable of desktop effects and stuff like Google Earth. Compiz runs perfectly. When the GP wrote "cutting edge graphics" he was talking about stuff like Crysis 2 and maybe professional 3D use. Few people actually need that.
  
  --
  "When I first heard Daydream Nation it quite frankly scared the living shit out of me." -- Matthew Stearns
Yet Another API by arivanov · 2011-02-26 00:54 · Score: 2

Sigh... That makes what? 4 or 5 different APIs.
Original XvMC
Via XvMC VLD extension
Nvidia - three options - legacy, their bitstream and using CUDA
Intel
Sigh... Can't we just get along and agree on a single standard?

--
Baker's Law: Misery no longer loves company. Nowadays it insists on it
http://www.sigsegv.cx/
1. Re:Yet Another API by MrEricSir · 2011-02-26 01:12 · Score: 2
  
  Fractured API standards are the standard in the open source world. Just look at A/V APIs, web rendering APIs, KDE vs. GTK, etc.
  As long as they can work together programmatically, it's not necessarily a bad thing to have different APIs.
  
  --
  There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
2. Re:Yet Another API by Chuckles08 · 2011-02-26 01:47 · Score: 2
  
  This does seem to be a recurring theme in the open source world. On the one hand, it's great to have/try lots of approaches but we need a more effective way of elevating the most successful to the top. Seems like connecting social media more closely with these types of projects would enable discussion and opinions to act as a catalyst for promoting effective solutions.
  
  --
  Twenda Learning: Educational Apps that Engage.
3. Re:Yet Another API by Ant+P. · 2011-02-26 02:14 · Score: 2
  
  VA-API is the only standard that makes sense to implement, unless you like limiting your apps to nvidia/ati users only, or like writing three times as much code.
4. Re:Yet Another API by u17 · 2011-02-26 02:15 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  I figure eventually someone will write the right wrappers so apps only need to deal with one API.
  VA-API is the wrapper that you speak of. It has multiple backends, including backends for Intel cards, VDPAU and XvBA.
5. Re:Yet Another API by BitZtream · 2011-02-26 09:38 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  And this is something that most people in the OSS world (has nothing to do with OSS in general, just OSS allows it to happen easier) utterly fail to grasp.
  The bad thing with multiple APIs, that all do essentially the same thing is that they give 'choice'. I realize that most OSS users and indeed most techies LOVE choice, the rest of the world doesn't. Or rather, its not so much that they don't like choice, its that they are not educated about the choice enough to answer them effectively.
  GTK vs Qt/Gnome vs KDE is a great example, here its not the users choice thats a problem its the developers. Some devs use KDE, some use GNOME, some use their own toolkit, some use X primitives directly. And combine that all together on a desktop and you get one big ugly fucking mess where everything works slightly different and the user just ends up frustrated because they don't spend their entire lives having a circle jerk to discuss which GUI toolkit should rule them all.
  Multiple choices are NOT ALWAYS A GOOD THING, especially when you don't have the domain specific knowledge to make the choice, or someone else that knows nothing about you or your needs is making the choice for you.
  The Linux desktop is example of why choice is not always a good thing.
  I know, what I just said was complete blasphemy here, but its true.
  
  --
  Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
VDPAU is already an open standard by CajunArson · 2011-02-26 01:20 · Score: 3, Informative

Nvidia's VDPAU is already an open standard that other video drivers can implement in Linux for video acceleration, so I'm not sure what this buys us. VDPAU as implemented by Nvidia is also about the only video acceleration standard that isn't totally broken and that can accelerate videos beyond MPEG-2 as well.

--
AntiFA: An abbreviation for Anti First Amendment.
1. Re:VDPAU is already an open standard by Anonymous Coward · 2011-02-26 01:40 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  independence from binary-blob drivers is what it buys us.
Not open sourced by Kjella · 2011-02-26 01:47 · Score: 5, Informative

This headline is widely misleading. They've now documented their equivalent of nVidia's VDPAU blob, but it's only available when you run the closed source Catalyst driver. TFA says so quite clearly.

Before anyone starts wondering, this won't do much good for those hoping to see AMD's UVD2 engine supported by the open-source Radeon graphics drivers.

--
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Re:What's the reality? What is usable for MythTV? by jedidiah · 2011-02-26 06:41 · Score: 2

You can use what actually works while you wait for some academic or aesthetic ideal.
Some like to whine about how there are too many APIs around but the actual coders just take care of business. At least the Free Software coders do. That is why the libre tools for Linux are so much better at using this sort of stuff than what proprietary software exists for Linux.
If nvidia is no longer the only game in town then that can only be a good thing.

--
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.