Bug#588560: xserver-xorg-video-intel: generates confusing "FATAL: Module fbcon not found." message

["Alan W. Irwin" <irwin@beluga.phys.uvic.ca>]

On 2010-07-09 18:40+0100 Julien Cristau wrote:

> On Fri, Jul  9, 2010 at 10:12:20 -0700, Alan W. Irwin wrote:
>
> > Package: xserver-xorg-video-intel
> > Version: 2:2.9.1-4
> > Severity: minor
> >
> > There is plenty of advice on the internet to ignore this message which
> > is why I have classified this as a minor bug.  Nevertheless, when you
> > are fighting some X configuration issue and see this message it
> > introduces a lot of fear, uncertainty, and doubt about how you have
> > configured X.  Fortunately, I fought through to success (the issues I
> > encountered will be reported in a different bug), but the "FATAL"
> > message is still there with that successful X configuration which
> > means it really is a meaningless message just like the web says.  So
> > therefore, please just remove this useless and confusing message!
> >
> > Also, if this is the wrong package to report this bug (say if this is
> > caused by the X server rather than intel driver), please forward this
> > bug to the appropriate X package.
> The message comes from modprobe.  The message is harmless if it means
> your kernel has fbcon compiled in, but it isn't if it means fbcon is
> missing.  There's no way for X to know...

Does the kernel advertise somewhere (say in /proc) that it has fbcon
capability?

If not, shouldn't that kernel issue be addressed so that X can
discover whether or not the kernel has fbcon capability? The current
uncertainty about what this message means puts X users who are
struggling with X configuration in a bad position so I strongly hope a
solution can be found.

Alan
__________________________
Alan W. Irwin

Astronomical research affiliation with Department of Physics and Astronomy,
University of Victoria (astrowww.phys.uvic.ca).

Programming affiliations with the FreeEOS equation-of-state implementation
for stellar interiors (freeeos.sf.net); PLplot scientific plotting software
package (plplot.org); the libLASi project (unifont.org/lasi); the Loads of
Linux Links project (loll.sf.net); and the Linux Brochure Project
(lbproject.sf.net).
__________________________

Linux-powered Science
__________________________