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From: gblock@csd4.csd.uwm.edu (Gregory R Block)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Subject: Re: OS Graphic Card Support: Part II!
Message-ID: <9522@uwm.edu>
Date: 13 Feb 91 01:21:56 GMT
References: <44104@ut-emx.uucp>
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Reply-To: gblock@csd4.csd.uwm.edu
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Originator: gblock@csd4.csd.uwm.edu

From article <44104@ut-emx.uucp>, by greg@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Greg Harp):
> In article <28532.27b759c9@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu> 2fmlhiccup@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu writes:
> [Jason's post about standardizing video cards so the computer can figure out and
>  use any of them.]
> 
>>Any comments?
> 
> Yes.  Why not just DIG (Device-Independant Graphics) ?
> 
> You see, with DIG, any Joe off the street can build a video card for the Amiga,
> write a driver for it, and *BAM* new graphics features.  If Commodore just
> standardized the interface hardware then they'd have to set a limit somewhere.
> 
> With DIG, you wouldn't really be limited since later revisions of the OS could
> be written to take advantage of new features.  If a hardware standard was set,
> then the hardware would have to be eventually updated to add features.
> 
> BTW, Commodore was looking for some DIG experts a while back.  Makes ya' 
> wonder, eh?
> 

So, let's say they do their OS rewrite.  They could remove ALL code that uses
the custom chips.  Let's just say we want to apply DIG to the sound chips, too.
And maybe the blitter....  Anyways...  Apply it to anything we can.

Once removed, they could replace it with code that calls external drivers.  The
driver's name would default to the one for the custom chipset, which would
exist in ROM.  Perhaps.  Then, one would just have to set it to use other
drivers...  Who knows.  Perhaps set it up so that it reads the name of the
drivers to use from the devs:system-configuration file, so that the monitor
gets the output from the VERY beginning.....

Okay.  Now, let's see.  What's left?  How to handle the blitter moving data
to and from the card...  Maybe you could set it up so that there is a dma
chip on the card itself?   Or something.  As you can see, my forte' is not
hardware... :)
						Greg
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gblock@csd4.csd.uwm.edu | Amigas, amigas everywhere, but not a one can think.
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