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Linux Support Fades For 3Dfx Voodoo, Rage 128, VIA
An anonymous reader writes "The developers behind the Mesa 3D graphics library, which provides the default graphics driver support for most hardware on Linux (and BSD/Solaris), has ended their support for older hardware. Being removed from Mesa (and therefore versions of Linux distributions) is support for hardware like the 3Dfx Voodoo, Intel i810, ATI Rage, and S3 Savage graphics processors. Also drivers being dropped were for Matrox and VIA graphics. Mesa developers also decided it's time to end support for the BeOS operating system. Dropping this code lowered the developers' responsibility by some 100k L.O.C., so maybe we will see GL3 support and OpenCL in Linux a bit sooner."
Sounds like it's time for a legacy fork for old machines. Or maybe just keeping old versions alive, the way Linux distros do with other libraries.
-- hendrik
Xorg support for these cards isn't going away anytime soon though.
Climate Progress - Hell and High Water
Not running the latest software? Doom 3 running on a Voodoo 2 ;)
ASCII stupid question, get a stupid ANSI
Try as we might, we just can't manage to get you people to migrate to more modern hardware. Frozen and unchanging code means exactly that, the code is not being improved in any manner. We recently redid both the UI and video rendering interfaces. Say we want to further add some animation support to the video renderer for use on the OSD, that code needs to be written for each of Xshm, Xv, OpenGL, VDPAU, VAAPI, XvMC, and PVR-350 framebuffer output. In addition, that's primarily the work of one single guy. XvMC hasn't been supported on any useful hardware sold in the last couple years, and the PVR-350 hasn't been sold for over half a decade. So, we can either continue to support all of those modes, or we can drop the "old cruft" and maybe the people who aren't so cheap as to be unwilling to spend $20 on a video card can have something that looks a bit nicer.
Because if it hasn't been changed in 7 years, then chances are that nobody really knows the code. Consequently nobody is checking it nor is anybody likely to be paying attention to any breakage which might occur if they change the infrastructure and ultimately it's one more area in which a security vulnerability could pop into existence when somebody changes some other code.
Having essentially dead code in a project isn't a wise idea in most cases. But beyond that it's extra bandwidth that's not necessary for nearly everybody.
"Seems like it should require almost no effort."
My home server, built in 1999, runs at a maximum of 80W. That means it takes 2 kW (about $0.20) per day, at most. For about $500 I could build a machine that draws 20W, for a monetary savings of about $0.15 per day. In about 10 years, I could break even on what I spent on the new server, but by then, the hardware would be 10 years old again. What I have serves my purposes.
You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
Most or all of these drivers were already broken because no one cared enough to maintain them or even test them from time to time. Anyone who needs the old drivers can compile out an older version of Mesa from git and run that. Which they already had to do.
It was also said that if someone comes along who is actually interested in maintaining one of the removed drivers, that the driver would be restored to the source tree.
Nothing to see here, move along.
Say we want to further add some animation support to the video renderer for use on the OSD, that code needs to be written for each of Xshm, Xv, OpenGL, VDPAU, VAAPI, XvMC, and PVR-350 framebuffer output. In addition, that's primarily the work of one single guy.
And people wonder why some F/OSS projects have a slow rate of development.
> The developer needs to fulfil the requirements of the client. It is not the developer's place to dictate the requirements to the client.
Here's your refund.
It would become part of a botnet within hours, that's why. Once your OS and web browser stop getting security updates, the clock starts ticking on the bad guys finding some unpatched vulnerability and your wandering into some trap they've set for you on the net.