A line in the sand for graphics drivers

“Support for certain classes of hardware has often been
problematic for the Linux kernel, and 3D graphics chips have tended
to be at the top of the list. Over the last few years, through a
combination of openness at Intel and AMD/ATI and reverse
engineering for NVIDIA, the graphics problem has mostly been solved
– for desktop systems. The situation in the fast-growing mobile
space is not so comforting, though. As can be seen in recent
conversations, free support for mobile graphics looks like the next
big problem to be solved.

“At a first glance, the announcement of a 2D/3D driver for
Qualcomm “ES 3D” graphics cores (found in the Snapdragon processor
which, in turn, is found in a number of high-end smartphones) seems
like a good thing. Graphics support for this core is one of the
binary blobs which is necessary to run Android on that processor,
and it seemed like Qualcomm was saying the right things:

“I’m writing this email because we think it is high time that we
get off the bench, into the game and push support for the Qualcomm
graphics cores to the mainline kernel. We are looking for advice
and comment from the community on the approach we have taken and
what steps we might need to take, if any, to modify the driver so
it can be accepted.

“Advice and comment is what he got.”

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