[LinuxBIOS] RESEND: patch: fix the problem with CONFIG_CONSOLE_VGA not pulling in the emulator

[ron minnich]

On Jan 3, 2008 9:31 PM, Corey Osgood <corey.osgood at gmail.com> wrote:

> This is, I believe, a moot point. Saying that all boards have a PCI slot
> doesn't mean that a user/developer wants to or has any intention of
> using it. Think of situations where an embedded board is dropped into a
> specialized case and sold as a project, for instance, the msntv2. The
> board inside (rca rm4100) does have a PCI "slot", but no header, and the
> case is designed such that pci cards are not meant to be used. In such a
> case, there's no reason to include the rom emulator, increasing the size
> (if ever so slightly), nor a reason to search for a video option rom,
> increasing the boot time, if there is no rom to run.

Very true. But it's also not saying they do NOT want to be able to do
it. That's what makes this so messy. But that's what the targets
config file is for -- so you can reset an option that doesn't fit a
particular case. It's why those files were set up that way in the
first place.

>I apologize for the rather scalding response your patch has
> had, these are the types of responses to patches this community does not
> need, because we will scare away very experienced and good developers.

I'm sorry if it sounded that way, but the problem was and remains that
Luc's patch removes a capability that people asked us for. It really
is not unusual (it just happened to me recently) for someone to come
to me with a 5 year old motherboard and need a new build. When we
remove options we need to be aware of the ramifications.

> I think that we need a 3rd option, something like
> CONFIG_NATIVE_VGA_INIT, to do what you want and skip the video option
> rom search. I think that would make everyone happy ;)

Well, we have several cases in fact.

- native vga init,
- option roms for vga
- option roms for everything not vga

So we need something that supports these combinations, as users come
up with new ways of combining them.

thanks

ron