ubuntu bulletproof x

[Douglas McClendon]

Jeff Spaleta wrote:
> On 9/2/07, Douglas McClendon <dmc.fedora at filteredperception.org> wrote:
>> Honestly I can't vouch that this is ever the case.  It is pure
>> speculation on my part.  But I for one get sick of hearing "you're
>> hardware is broken, go suck an egg", when clearly that hardware is not
>> broken enough to not work on windows, using the mechanisms they have in
>> place (e.g. presumably reading the data from the driver cd).
> 
> Okay.... here is where the conversation stops.  If this is complete
> speculation..then there is no constructive way forward.  Adam Jackson
> has already commented that in his opinion what is provided in the inf
> files is not enough to fix the problem.  I strongly suggest that you
> go re-read everything that he wrote concerning the history of Fedora's
> usage of the code Ubuntu is relying on now to parse inf files. Read
> it... read it again.. and then when you think you understand it...read
> it again.

Here is the part that confuses me-

"
The whole reason we're _not_ using this very much - and that I've
effectively stopped updating MonitorsDB - is because the inf files don't
give you useful information.  They give you sync ranges and that's about
it.  So you end up in some pretty hilarious situations, because X
prefers width over height, so even though your monitor's 1600x1200, the
sync range is big enough to fit 1680x1050, so you'll try to fit that,
and lose.
"

This, please correct me if I'm wrong, is the relevant portion of the
indisputable Mr Jackson's claim.

I personally focus on this portion-

"
They give you sync ranges and that's about
it.
"

To me, that seems like it might be enough.  The fact that ubuntu is
investing so much energy in this, makes me suggest that there might be
something to it.

The indisputable Mr. Jackson's followup as to why this is useless is

"
So you end up in some pretty hilarious situations, because X
prefers width over height, so even though your monitor's 1600x1200, the
sync range is big enough to fit 1680x1050, so you'll try to fit that,
and lose.
"

Which sounds really stupid to me.  It sounds like a trivial thing to me,
to modify X so that it doesn't exclusively prefer width over height,
resulting in the "hilarious situation" described.

Honestly it doesn't sound very hard at all to modify X so that it
understands that 1600x1200 is more preferable than 1680x1050.

With that improvement, going only by my speculation, and the
indisputable opinions/facts provided by Mr Jackson, I suspect there is 
room for value in the ubuntu-bulletproof-x method.

Now, I didn't reread the indisputable Mr. Jackson's claims the 5 times
that you suggested.  Please feel free to ban me from this list, if you
feel that I have nothing to offer the technical discussion.

Regards,

-dmc