xorg configuration for the non-free nvidia driver

[Andreas Beckmann]

On 2011-07-11 19:33, Julien Cristau wrote:
> I very much dislike the idea of using alternatives for configuration
> files.

I understand the concerns regarding alternatives and configuration
files, especially if update-alternatives is buggy when it comes to files
sitting in the place of alternatives targets (#633627).

So does anyone have a suggestion how to simplify the configuration of
nvidia-glx using a different approach? This would be interesting mainly
for new installations, not updates.

* libGL.so.1 and libglx.so need to be replaced by the proprietary
  versions. This is done automatically by diversions (package
  glx-diversions) and (slave) alternatives (package glx-alternative-
  nvidia) upon installation of nvidia-glx. Manual reconfiguration (e.g.
  switching back to MESA) is easy and does not require package removal:
    update-alternatives --configure glx
* an xorg.conf (or xorg.conf.d/ snippet) has to be created because xorg
  autoconfiguration does not detect the proprietary drivers, so we
  need a 'Driver "nvidia"' line somewhere. Autoconfig of modes etc.
  usually works fine.
  The user should be able to add more directives to customize his
  configuration (e.g. by using nvidia-settings or nvidia-xconfig).
  An xorg.conf with 'Driver "nvidia"' "breaks" Xorg if the proprietary
  driver is not available, e.g. the glx alternative is set to mesa. So
  the configuration using the proprietary driver should be moved out of
  the way in that case.
  The new apporach should be easily adaptable for other proprietary
  drivers, e.g. fglrx.


Andreas