nv question...

[Colin Guthrie]

Alex Stewart wrote:
> I have no idea about DKMS as I've never used it.  I believe it's intended to
> make things like the Nvidia proprietary driver work more seamlessly when
> changing kernels, but can't speak as to whether it actually works or not for
> that purpose.  My personal suggestion, though, would be to try just using the
> installer and instructions that Nvidia provides first and not use DKMS.  No
> need to complicate things by adding a third-party utility until you know the
> basic stuff works first.
> 
> (After you get it working in the usual way, then you might want to look into
> DKMS to make it easier when you change kernels later, but DKMS shouldn't be
> needed to get it to work initially..)

On this point, I personally disagree. Having helped people out on the
Mandriva mailing list, the nvidia installer was always a PITA. It may be
different now as I've not used it for a long time due to the lack of any
nv h/w at present.

It used to rename Mesa libs which would in turn cause problems with
using Xgl when that was needed (I know this isn't needed anymore with
newer drivers).

Also if the distro released an updated Mesa package then it would
overwrite again the libGL provided by nvidia!! It was always a PITA!!
The dkms packaging and library packaging solved all that and "Just
Worked(tm)". No hassles when kernel/mesa was updated and if nvidia
released a new driver which we packaged it would just automatically come
to my machine during my next update check which was nice.

So i'd say, if you distro has it, use the DKMS package. No doubt others
who use it have already suffered the pain and made it as easy as
possible for you!

This is however, my opinion. YMMV :D

Col