nvidia

[Claude Jones]

On Sun October 28 2007, Ric Moore wrote:
> You know me, Claude ...I bitched for months trying to figure out what
> was wrong, before finally getting Croquet to run. When the solution
> appeared, I was floored for wasting those months. While I'm grateful
> that nVidia supports linux and offer a driver package, I hope that
> nVidia will open their code, so this kinda stuff doesn't happen to
> anyone else. I seriously doubt that they would lose one bit of their
> sales. Ric

I would be curious to know the answer to that one. The implication might be 
that the Livna packager is removing something from the nVidia package before 
making the Fedora rpm...but, that may not be right. Since the guts of the 
nVidia driver is a binary, I don't understand what the packager could be 
removing -- I'm sure there's something I don't know in all this. Learning the 
answer would expand my knowledge.

Have you tried the packages from freshrpm's? 

I run nVidia cards in 5 of my 6 Linux boxes, and I use the freshrpm driver in 
all. It's a done-once installation because the Dell dkms package takes over 
after that, and automatically builds a new kernel-module on the fly as I'm 
rebooting after each kernel upgrade. I have noted over time, that several 
people assert that the tar-balls from nVidia are superior to the rpm's that 
are available from Livna (there's very little discussion of the freshrpm 
variant on this list) - in my experience, that has not been the case, but, I 
don't use croquet, for example. 

So far as Les' argument, I don't have a strong view. I can see both sides. For 
most of my friends who are not real interested in computing as a hobby, but 
who decide to try Linux, I generally put PCLinuxOS on their machines. 
PCLinuxOS does make one-click installation of nVidia drivers possible. They 
do much else that makes the experience much easier for the novice. (That 
happens to be their stated goal, a 'Windows-like' experience)

I prefer Fedora for many reasons. AND, I happen to respect their position on 
the free software question. I think that there's room for both positions in 
linux-land. I think there's a strong case to be made for a significant 
faction in the Linux community to stick their free-only guns -- it helps 
drive the whole open-source movement, and the general goals of that movement 
I do support, especially the development of open-source superior alternatives 
to all proprietary software. The devil is in the details...how to get there 
from where we are. There's room for different approaches as I see things 
right now. 

-- 
Claude Jones
Brunswick, MD, USA