Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!wuarchive!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!mips!sgi!shinobu!odin!ramoth.esd.sgi.com!msc From: msc@ramoth.esd.sgi.com (Mark Callow) Newsgroups: comp.sys.sgi Subject: Re: SGI's migration to X Message-ID: <1990Sep4.213844.9865@odin.corp.sgi.com> Date: 4 Sep 90 21:38:44 GMT References: <208@voodoo.UUCP> Sender: news@odin.corp.sgi.com (Net News) Reply-To: msc@sgi.com Organization: Silicon Graphics Inc., Entry Systems Division Lines: 27 In article , jim@baroque.Stanford.EDU (James Helman) writes: |> |> There's no need to use single pixel transfers, but the basic problem |> of trying to cram lots of data down a narrow pipe is inherent in |> imaging on network window systems. There are various implementations |> that use shared memory for these transfers when possible. Sun has |> something along these lines called Direct Graphics Access. Perhaps, |> SGI will work to improve X's image transfer performance as well as |> supporting GL calls in X windows. |> DGA is a mechanism that allows graphics intensive applications to talk directly to the graphics hardware completely bypassing the window server. It is not as Jim suggests, a shared memory connection between client and server. SGI has always had "direct graphics access". We've simply never marketed it as a feature. To us it's a necessity. I showed Sun how to do DGA in NeWS. On Sun's, DGA only improves performance for XGL (no relation), and possibly SunPHIGS, applications. It does nothing for X applications. On the SGI only GL applications have direct access to the graphics hardware. -- From the TARDIS of Mark Callow msc@ramoth.sgi.com, ...{ames,decwrl}!sgi!msc "There is much virtue in a window. It is to a human being as a frame is to a painting, as a proscenium to a play. It strongly defines its content."