[ubuntu-x] KMS integration

[Bryce Harrington]

On Sun, May 31, 2009 at 08:13:52PM +0200, unggnu wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> when is the integration of KMS planned for Karmic.

All of the pieces needed for testing KMS are included in Karmic now.  It
just requires a couple config settings to switch it on:

  https://wiki.ubuntu.com/X/KernelModeSetting

UXA will be enabled by default when I put in the 2.7.99 -intel later
this week.  The kernel team will set the KMS config option on by default
at some point this month; I don't have an ETA on that but would assume
it to be in place by alpha-3.

Meanwhile, we're at work on creating an xorg-edgers LiveCD for people to
download and use in testing bleeding edge X and kernel bits.  Tormod has
made great progress at setting this up already.

The intial objective of the edgers cd image will be for KMS testing -
first -intel, then later -ati and -nouveau as those bits become
available for testing.  Later, this will be turned to other X / Kernel
testing efforts as appropriate.

> There is no need for a shiny Plymouth theme or 
> something like that now

In fact, it was decided at UDS not to use Plymouth.  Instead, efforts
will focus on improvement of the boot speed to make a splash screen
unnecessary anyway.  For cases where bootspeed is excessive for whatever
reason, usplash will continue to be used.

A way to help with the boot speed work is to install the 'bootchart'
package and review logs in your /var/log/bootchart/ directory.  The
objective is to reduce boot time to < 12 sec.  On my karmic laptop it's
taking in excess of 55 sec, so it appears there is much room for
improvement.

> One huge regression is http://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=20901 
> but I guess the Intel devs fix this before release or get rid of the 
> composite textured video tearing 
> http://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=20664.

Yes, I spoke with jbarnes at UDS last week about both these
regressions.  They're known issues with work ongoing upstream.  I don't
consider them blockers to moving ahead with adoption of KMS, but it is
valuable for us to keep track of them.

For now, unggnu, could you please add mention of these regressions to
the Alpha release notes?

Bryce