On Tue, 21 Jan 2003, Andreas Beck wrote: > Fabio Alemagna <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Stupid question from an outsider: couldn't it be possible to make the > > application still run by making it use an offscreen buffer while not > > "visible" because of VT switching? It would be really annoying, imho, if > > the application stopped altogether... > > Been there, done that. Annoying.
What exactly is "annoying"? > Early versions of scrdrv (the ancestor of KGI) did that. That was o.k., > then, when we were dealing with 1MB graphics memory or similar. > > Even then I even went as far as making up a userspace _daemon_ that > saved away the framebuffer for the application and then switched > (with kernel help) mappings under the application's ass to keep the > application happy and running. > > However that didn't and doesn't work with the application accessing the > Hardware in any other way than just the framebuffer or kernelside > calls (the old ioctl() method we used) anyway. > > The Hardware has quite some state, and not all of it can be retirieved > easily. Thus basically IMHO we will have to face the fact, that the > application will have to cooperate a little when switching away. If Amigas can do it, if AROS can do it, then also kgi can do it. Even windows can do it, heck. > My typical configuration here runs X at 1600x1200x32. That's about 8MB. > > Now if I run quite a set of Apps on some consoles, I'm quickly at 40MB, > even if I use no texture or similar at all. Yes, and you will have to save that stuff somewhere _anyway_, because how else are you going to restore it when the application's VT gets switched on again? So, you see, you need an offscreen buffer anyway. > Now what happens on switch away: We will then _NEED_ the memory. > Giving it only if available doesn't help. Either I can rely on being > backing-stored or not. Thus the mem would have to be paged free > if necessary ... can take quite some time when mem is tight and > disks are slow. It happens all the times when using X, so why shoudln't it happen when using the console? If the user opens 10 apps all using big screens at big depths, then he should be aware that he needs a lot of ram. Fabio Alemagna
