I do know this, the register poke has been present in the linux kernel framebuffer driver since 2002 (http://seclists.org/lists/linux-kernel/2002/Jan/att-6384/neofb-0.3.1-linux-2.4.18-pre6.patch), as well as present in XFree86 since April 2003 (http://cvsweb.xfree86.org/cvsweb/*checkout*/xc/programs/Xserver/hw/xfree86/drivers/neomagic/neo_driver.c?rev=1.67)
Neither the kernel fb team nor the XFree86 team mention what the register poke does, just that it speeds up framebuffer operations.
So, I'll look into it more, and let you know what I find out. Thanks for all you work on Debian, Tony Hill tonyhill@iastate.edu Branden Robinson wrote:
I'm not a big fan of voodoo programming, though I do understand that it's all the rage among MPlayer developers. I don't suppose any explanation of this mystical hex poke is available anywhere? Without further explanation, I won't apply this patch as-is. I might support it with a driver option, "MysticalRegisterPoke", which defaults off. But I'd really rather have enough information to make an informed decision.