Re: [xougen] Adding cruft to X

[Jonathan Walther]

On Sun, Sep 07, 2003 at 09:04:53AM -0500, Steve Nickolas wrote:
> Adding these things to X goes entirely against the spirit of X.  If 
> something is to be done that "embraces and extends" in such a way, I am 
> not for it.

I suggest, then, that you haven't fully grokked the spirit of X. Sound
support is not against the spirit of X.  A widget service is against it.
Disply PDF and Display Postscript are in a gray area.

> And, notice I said "graphics-rendering".  Sound is not its concern. 
> Yes, it would help to have a standard sound system, but it has nothing 
> to do with X.

You should have been on the list earlier.  If the X server is only to do
graphics rendering, why don't we remove keyboard and mouse support as
well, and have separate, specialized servers to handle them?

The X server is the kernel of a desktop distribution.  Should we remove
the sound drivers from the Linux kernel because it's job is only to
support frame-buffers?  The Linux kernel does many things, but it does
the minimum amount necessary to allow other applications to do what they
need to do.  That is the same spirit behind the X server and protocol.
X is the kernel for a desktop, not a gussied up network version of
Microsofts DirectX library.

Jonathan

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