From: WolfWings ShadowFlight <wolfwings@lightspeed.net>
  To  : ggi-develop@eskimo.com
  Date: Fri, 14 Aug 1998 05:34:45 -0700 (PDT)

Re: Quake 2! (was: SVGALib Wrapper...)

On Fri, 14 Aug 1998, Marcus Sundberg wrote:

>One should also note that the SVGAlib wrapper is not meant for
>software where the source is avalable, but for apps like Quake
>which is binary only.

Straight from the .plan of the (in)famous Zoid:

I am investigating support for GGI as well, but haven't done any
implementations yet. Any GGI guys wanna gimme a hand in this?

And now, the full .plan update this came from: (It's LONG!)

I've been doing some work on the Linux ports of Quake and Quake2. There are
several different versions floating around out there with some problems in
each and some outstanding bugs. I'm ratifing all the ports to use a common
set of code for video, audio and input. I'm also adding some new support
such as glX support for GLQuake/Quake2 ref_gl so that there will be a version
of GLQ/Q2 ref_gl that is not dependant on the fxMesa code in Mesa 3-D and
should work with all GL renderers that are available for Linux (tho it isn't
playable without hardware support). I'm also working on building glibc5
versions of the executables as well. I plan to release both libc5 and glibc
versions of the binaries in the future.

These new glX based versions obselete the use of qkHacklib.

I've also ported 3DFX's OpenGL miniport (GLQuake driver) for Linux.
The miniport is implemented as a lib replacement for libMesaGL.so that
emulates the fxMesa...() interface. It's faster than Mesa 3-D on
lower end CPUs right now, and will support multitexture on the
VooDoo2s.

Mesa 3-D 3.0 also supports multitexture, so it will be interesting to
compare the speed differences between the two.

My drivers support list looks like this:
SQuake/Quake2 ref_soft.so:
   - requires svgalib, preferably 1.3.0 or later. Console only. Requires root
   permissions (setuid).
Quake.x11/Quake2 ref_softx.so:
   - X11 based software rendering, requires X11. Doesn't need root if
   /dev/audio is writable.
GLQuake/GLQuake2 ref_glfx.so:
   - requires SVGALib for keyboard/mouse input, Mesa 3-D with fxMesa support
     compiled in. Only runs at the console. This version requires svgalib
     1.3.0 now. Still requires root for both svgalib and glide.
     (note that ref_gl.so will be glX based now and a new ref_glfx.so will
     be for old svgalib/fxMesa hardwired support).
GLQuake.glx/GLQuake2 ref_gl.so:
   - glX based and uses X11 for keyboard/mouse input. This version should work
   with all existing GL/glX implementations for Linux. Vendors of Hardware
   GL/glX implementations for Linux should contact me about testing with their
   implementation. This currently requires root with Mesa 3-D because of
   the glide depenancy, but other hardware GL/glX implementations should not.

   You have to do a 'export MESA_GLX_FX=fullscreen' to hack Mesa 3-D into
   using the 3DFX instead of software rendering for now.

I am investigating support for GGI as well, but haven't done any
implementations yet. Any GGI guys wanna gimme a hand in this?

I'm planning to release rpm installs of the new versions of Quake/Quake2
in the future that auto-install in /usr/games/quake and /usr/games/quake2
as needed.

One of the reasons for this plan update is I need some beta testers to help
in testing these implementations. I need beta testers with the following
requirements:
   - Own a copy of Quake and/or Quake2
   - Be able to test software and GL renders
   - Be able to test libc5 and glibc versions
   - Report bugs and retest new versions.

Please note, a beta tester is NOT someone who gets to play with stuff before
other people do. They are someone who wants to help out in the development
and evolution of Quake for Linux.

If you feel you have the ability to run this new code and help out in finding
and eliminating bugs, please drop me a line and I'll add you to the beta
tester list.

/// Zoid.
zoid@idsoftware.com
             _
     _     _|_  WolfWings ShadowFlight
| | | | | | | | wolfwings@lightspeed.net
| | | | | | | | "Love is a bird,
|_|_| |_|_| | |  She needs to fly...
 _           /   Let all the hurt,
 \-.______,-'    Inside of you die..." - Madonna, Frozen