[Nechen]

So I went ahead and did a fresh install to F16 and decided to give KDE a try (4.8 just looked too sexy to pass up) and the install went smooth as always.

However, I went about installing the Nvidia drivers per the if-not-true-then-false group's website (which has always worked for me) and it just BROKE.

My "plasma workspace" was non functional, the only thing I could get in to was the Konsole in Failsafe. I ended up having to drop down to init 3, do a yum installed *nvidia* and deleted everything from AKMOD and so on.

After a dracut --force and reboot I managed to get to Nouveau drivers running again and Nvidia was gone.

Some searching on the interwebz seems to reveal incompatability isssues with glibc on KDE and the Nvidia drivers themselves. Although admittedly that info is 1-2 months old so I'm not sure if this is still the case.

Can any other KDE'ers help me out here? I'd like to get the Nvidia drivers working as the Desktopeffects/Kwin don't seem to want to run

[TalRW]

I would advise against using proprietary software because it restricts your computing freedom.

I would use the nouveau drivers which is libre software and are actively being developed.

[Nechen]

I'm not sure I understand how Nvidia's drivers restricts my freedom?

I'm just trying to get my Video Card to work so I can have a rotating cube...

[ihrsetrdr]

Originally Posted by Nechen

I'm not sure I understand how Nvidia's drivers restricts my freedom?

I hope that the following snippet from the link will help clarify:

Adding nonfree software to the GNU/Linux system may increase the popularity, if by popularity we mean the number of people using some of GNU/Linux in combination with nonfree software. But at the same time, it implicitly encourages the community to accept nonfree software as a good thing, and forget the goal of freedom. It is not good to drive faster if you can't stay on the road.

When the nonfree “add-on” is a library or programming tool, it can become a trap for free software developers. When they write free software that depends on the nonfree package, their software cannot be part of a completely free system. Motif and Qt trapped large amounts of free software in this way in the past, creating problems whose solutions took years. Motif remained somewhat of a problem until it became obsolete and was no longer used. Later, Sun's nonfree Java implementation had a similar effect: the Java Trap, fortunately now mostly corrected.

If our community keeps moving in this direction, it could redirect the future of GNU/Linux into a mosaic of free and nonfree components. Five years from now, we will surely still have plenty of free software; but if we are not careful, it will hardly be usable without the nonfree software that users expect to find with it. If this happens, our campaign for freedom will have failed.

If releasing free alternatives were simply a matter of programming, solving future problems might become easier as our community's development resources increase. But we face obstacles that threaten to make this harder: laws that prohibit free software. As software patents mount up, and as laws like the DMCA are used to prohibit the development of free software for important jobs such as viewing a DVD or listening to a RealAudio stream, we will find ourselves with no clear way to fight the patented and secret data formats except to reject the nonfree programs that use them.

Meeting these challenges will require many different kinds of effort. But what we need above all, to confront any kind of challenge, is to remember the goal of freedom to cooperate. We can't expect a mere desire for powerful, reliable software to motivate people to make great efforts. We need the kind of determination that people have when they fight for their freedom and their community—determination to keep on for years and not give up.

In our community, this goal and this determination emanate mainly from the GNU Project. We're the ones who talk about freedom and community as something to stand firm for; the organizations that speak of “Linux” normally don't say this. The magazines about “Linux” are typically full of ads for nonfree software; the companies that package “Linux” add nonfree software to the system; other companies “support Linux” by developing nonfree applications to run on GNU/Linux; the user groups for “Linux” typically invite salesman to present those applications. The main place people in our community are likely to come across the idea of freedom and determination is in the GNU Project.

Full statement here:

http://www.gnu.org/gnu/why-gnu-linux.html

[Nechen]

Now I'm even more confused (please excuse me)

What do they mean by nonfree applications? Nvidia doesn't charge for their drivers and the only pay-for software I've come across is Crossover Linux (Which seems like a reasonable product given what they offer.)

Is the whole point to get the community to volunteer their time for free? I find that slightly off given how much money RHEL makes by itself, not counting the many other platforms out there.

Be that as it may, I kind of like Nvidia and still don't understand why I shouldn't use their drivers (Except the pain-in-the-ass install.) If the Nouveau drivers will work with Kwin thats awesome, I just need help getting the bloody thing to work

[habbajabba]

I installed using this guide with no problem.
http://forums.fedoraforum.org/showthread.php?t=204752
Unfortunately fedora16 had so many updates it simply broke itself after a week or so and I went back to salineos.

I think one of the major differences between free and non-free is code. It is either freely available to look at or it isn't. Whether or not it costs anything has nothing to do with anything.

As far as using noveau over the official, neither one will let you use cuda so it almost doesn't even matter, to me, as no matter what I do I do not get the same performance as under windows with cuda. I'm going back to ati when I ever buy another card.

[ihrsetrdr]

The term "free"(as in freedom) is just as much a philosophy as it is a practical matter. The following link has the in depth explanation:

http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/

[Nechen]

WOW I'm thick. I get it now - thanks

Makes perfect sense now, although I wasn't aware of the CUDA thing. I can think of several companies that fall under the aggrivating category.

I guess the only semi-plausible excuse I could ever come up with for these not releasing the code is that someone else might try to copy it and resell it. Although how or why someone would do that with GPU/Sound Card drivers is beyond me. The only software I can think of that wanted to prevent that was Cyanogenmod but he explained it pretty clearly.


So moving on...how come Kwin tells me "The following could not be started (Lists EVERY feature in Kwin I selected)" under Nouveau ??

[Nechen]

If anyone could please look at this, it appears I do not have DIrect Rendering under Nouveau:

glxinfo | grep -i direct
Xlib: extension "GLX" missing on display ":0".
Xlib: extension "GLX" missing on display ":0".
Xlib: extension "GLX" missing on display ":0".
Xlib: extension "GLX" missing on display ":0".
Xlib: extension "GLX" missing on display ":0".
Error: couldn't find RGB GLX visual or fbconfig
Xlib: extension "GLX" missing on display ":0".
Xlib: extension "GLX" missing on display ":0".
Xlib: extension "GLX" missing on display ":0".
Xlib: extension "GLX" missing on display ":0".
Xlib: extension "GLX" missing on display ":0".
Xlib: extension "GLX" missing on display ":0".
Xlib: extension "GLX" missing on display ":0".

[Nechen]

Hate to resurrect this thread but I did a complete reinstall and left the drivers THE HELL alone. I'm sticking with Nouveau for the time being and ALL of the KDE (4.7.4) effects seem to be working without any issues.

Although if someone could shed some light on why I had such a nightmare with the Nvidia drivers I'd appreciate the educational experience. I did what I always did and that was do a full system update after install, grab AKMOD, and blacklist Nouveau.

I think the only thing that makes any sense are scattered reports of KDE not liking Nvidia drivers or vice versa so I don't know.

[Charr]

It could be due to the kernel version, specific drivers tend to support only specific ranges of kernel versions. They might compile, but will not run properly.

Nouveau ships in the kernel, so you won't have to worry about that.

[rrohbeck]

Nvidia is generally behind kernel releases. Whenever anything changes in the kernel it may break Nvidia's code because Nvidia's driver, being non-free, isn't accessible to developers so they can't test or fix it. Same with VMware BTW. That's because the kernel APIs change over time.

[Nechen]

I'm trying to dig through Nvidia and figure out if they even claim what Kernel it's compatible with

So such luck yet...