[info-performer] dual screen stereo on Linux!

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From: Hugh Fisher (hugh.fisher++at++anu.edu.au)
Date: 07/29/2004 20:44:14


 In April I wrote about problems getting Performer apps to
 run on a dual screen active stereo VR system under Linux.
 It's now working thanks mostly to some good advice from
 Wunibald Karl of VIRES.

 Here's what I had to do for my Quadro 750 graphics card:

 * Use the 4496 nvidia driver.

 * export __GL_SYNC_TO_VBLANK=1 and PF_NV_VSYNC_WORKS=1.
 The first comes from the nvidia README, but I'd never
 heard of the second until Wunibald emailed me.

 The nvidia doco doesn't say anything about vsync across
 dual screens being kept in sync, especially if you turn
 UBB off (below), but it seems to work so far.

 * Tweaked the XF86Config-4 file to turn active stereo on
 and UBB off. The latter might not actually be necessary,
 but it's working now and I don't want to touch it.

 * Downgrade Performer to version 3.0.1. The links have
 been removed, but you can/could still download the older
 version by manually editing the URL.

 Here's where the fun starts. Performer 3.0.1 won't run
 on RedHat Linux >= 8, or similar modern distros. At
 startup it reports a dynamic link error for __ctype_b.

 This turns out to be caused by the FSF changing the
 exported symbols in libc. Going back through mailing
 lists, not only did this screw up Performer, but also
 Oracle and Intel.

 The fix is to rebuild /lib/libc.so with __ctype_b
 exported as a normal symbol. And I'd thought editing
 XF86Config files was scary. Eventually I managed to
 struggle through the process and still have a working
 PC afterwards.

 Moral: if you have an Onyx, stick with it!

 More gory details available by email if you're
 interested.

        Hugh Fisher
        DCS, ANU


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