[PATCH] modes: Force output modes for manually enabled heads

[Adam Jackson]

On Thu, 2009-10-08 at 10:44 -0700, Aaron Plattner wrote:
> On Thu, Oct 08, 2009 at 10:09:20AM -0700, Keith Packard wrote:
> > Excerpts from Chris Wilson's message of Thu Oct 08 09:43:16 -0700 2009:
> > > In a headless configuration, in order to convince the XServer to start
> > > the user must explicitly enable an output.
> > 
> > I see that as the fundemental problem here. I'd suggest that the
> > server should allow the device to start without any outputs connected
> > and create a default sized frame buffer (1024x768?).
> 
> For boards that actually have output connectors (i.e. not Tesla cards),
> this is a bad idea.  The number of users who actually want a headless
> configuration is much smaller than the number of users who would be
> confused and infuriated when starting X makes all of their displays go
> blank due to misconfiguration or driver bugs and results in what is
> essentially a hung machine.
> 
> X failing to start with an informative log message is far better than a
> frozen computer that requires the reset button to fix.  I think making
> people explicitly configure X to be headless is a reasonable compromise.

Disagree.  Servers regularly start with no monitor attached and admins
expect to be able to walk up and plug in a display and have it work.

Presumably this implies moving to a model where X is started as a
trigger from the kernel seeing a connected output, and not the current
"start and hope".

- ajax
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