Intel Releases Ivy Bridge Programming Docs Under CC License 113
An anonymous reader writes "The Ivy Bridge graphics processor from Intel is now fully documented under the Creative Commons. Intel released four volumes of documents (2400+ pages) covering their latest graphics core as a complete programming guide with register specifications. Included with the graphics documentation is their new execution unit and video engine."
That's a lot of information (Score:3, Interesting)
We've come a long way since the 47 registers and paltry documentation of the Commodore 64's 6567 video chip. My question is, who can actually master these modern systems before they are obsolete? No one person, I think, can gobble 2400 pages of documentation to work with a graphics system. Are people now merely specialists of one tiny subset of a system, never to understand what is going on overall? That might explain why we need 600M device drivers these days.
Re:Take that you morons at nVidia! (Score:5, Interesting)
I don't understand why these Microsoft-style closed source morons always think not allowing people to use what they sell will help them.
You're asking a question about market behavior, but the problem isn't a market problem (what you say makes sense, in a free market). Since the expected market behaviors don't exist, you have to ask, "why is this market broken?"
The standard answer is that they're violating thousands of patents six ways to Sunday, and the more open they are about their hardware the more risk they expose on these being found out.
Of course all the manufacturers are doing it because the patent system is so screwed up and the product would be impractical otherwise. People get grants on the obvious and necessary techniques all the time. And it's not just the big three where they could cross-license - there are trolls out there who just want to be parasites on the successful shops.
As usual, this is social engineering run amok. Yes, the reason you can't have good video drivers for linux is because the government has screwed up this market too. Take away this patent morass, and the vendors become interested in selling cards any way they can. Of course, the smartest-kids-in-the-room will now chime in and say that there simply wouldn't be any good video cards without the government getting involved. You decide which acutally makes sense.