The Linux Frame Buffer Device Subsystem

Links

• The linux-fbdev web site
• The Presentation I gave at Linux Expo '99.

Linux fbset

The latest version of fbset is fbset-2.1.tar.gz (dated 1999/06/23).

Penguin logos

Replace the politically-incorrect logos by new ones.

Linux fbutils

This is the home for the Linux Frame Buffer Device Utilities. This is heavily work-in-progress! Please discuss this on the linux-fbdev mailing list only.

Utilities

Currently the following utilities exist:

• fbset: Query/change frame buffer settings (mainly videomode)
• fbcmap: Query/change the colormap
• con2fbmap: Map virtual consoles to frame buffer devices
• fbconvert: Convert from the old fb.modes format to the new one

The new fbset video mode database

Video modes (class Videomode) now consist of 3 parts:

• Screen geometry (class Geometry)
• Pixel format (class Format)
• Virtual screen size (class Virtual)

You can predefine screen geometries and pixel formats, and refer to them when defining a video mode, e.g.

geometry {
    "640x400@70" { 640 400 39721 40 24 39 9 96 2 }
    "640x480@60" { 640 480 39721 40 24 32 11 96 2 }
}

format {
    "8bpp" { 8 }
    "15bpp" { 16 5/5/5 }
    "16bpp" { 16 5/6/5 }
}

mode {
    "640x400x8" { "640x400@70" "8bpp" virtual 1024 768 }
    "640x400x15" { "640x400@70" "15bpp" }
}
      

Well, not everything is implemented, but you get the idea.

Source Releases

• Latest version (CVS of linux-fbdev at SourceForge)
• fbutils_19990802.tar.gz
• fbutils_19990729.tar.gz

Feel free to complete this project!

Graphics Hardware

I'm working on a paper about graphics hardware.

• Graphics_Hardware_19991103.ps.gz