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NVIDIA is now publishing Linux GPU kernel modules

gustaveriksson1496

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So apparently NVIDIA is now supporting Linux operating systems. Any Linux fans that are excited about this or will you continue to use Windows?
 

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This is not new, NVIDIA has supported Linux since forever, but not open source. What's new is that they moved a lot of code into user space and open sourced a kernel-mode driver that's basically a shim.
 
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I'll continue to rock Windows even down my mom's rig. Can't be bothered with having garbage driver support and dealing with terminal at times...
 

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We have a whole news article on this from 2 days ago.

 

gustaveriksson1496

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We have a whole news article on this from 2 days ago.

Thanks for clarifying! I didn't see that, but I'll look more diligently next time before I post!

This is not new, NVIDIA has supported Linux since forever, but not open source. What's new is that they moved a lot of code into user space and open sourced a kernel-mode driver that's basically a shim.
Thanks for clarifying, I had no idea NVIDIA always supported Linux. I must have misread the article on NVIDIA's site, it sounded new.
 

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What's new is that they moved a lot of code into user space and open sourced a kernel-mode driver that's basically a shim.
This actually means a whole lot when it comes to driving GPUs. nouveau has been utter crap because of the reclocking problem because of nVidia's firmware. This move actually opens the possibility of changing that. Which means that we could easily see something similar to what we see with AMDGPU where the kernel bits are open source and ship with the kernel, but you have the option of using proprietary userspace code for handling all the GL magic or open source code maintained by the public, take your pick. Yes, there are still proprietary blobs for firmware, but AMD quite frankly has some of that too. They're just not as big of a dick about locking it down like nVidia is.

All in all, this is a great move in the right direction in my opinion. It's not the same kind of hostile behavior we've seen from nVidia in the past.
 

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All in all, this is a great move in the right direction in my opinion.
Absolutely, I just felt like I should clear up the assumption that "everything is open source now"
 
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