PC graphics terminology

[manleyd]

Am I the only one confused by PC graphics terminology?

Can anyone give a straight-forward explanation of the following terms, preferably from the point of view of an end user:

DRM
DRI
AGPGART
VESA
GLX
Frame buffer

I also would like to understand to what degree these technologies complement each other or overlap.

If you are fealing very helpful you might like to describe how to enable each one (e.g. kernel, xorg.conf ...).

Thanks in anticipation.

[lnxz]

The DRM (direct rendering manager, or something) is a Linux kernel module that gives direct hardware access to DRI clients.
DRI (Direct Rendering Infrastructure) is an interface used in the X Window System to securely allow user applications to access the video hardware without requiring data to be passed through the X Server. Its primary application is to provide hardware acceleration of the Mesa implementation of OpenGL. It has also been adapted to provide OpenGL acceleration on a framebuffer console without an X Server running
Framebuffer is a graphic hardware-independent abstraction layer to show graphics on a console without relying on system-specific libraries such as svgalib or the heavy overhead of the X Window System.
Agpgart I think is a module that interacts with agp cards.
VESA is short for The Video Electronics Standards Association.
GLX provides the glue connecting OpenGL and the X Window System and is required
by any OpenGL implementation using X, or so I believe.

Framebuffer can be enabled in Device Drivers --> Graphics Support
DRI and agpgart can be enabled in Device Drivers --> Character Devices

[manleyd]

Thanks, thats helpful.

[lnxz]

If you want to enable dri and glx in xorg, you do that in the module section in xorg.conf. For example, my module section looks like this:

[lunarg]

[Deathwing00]

Moved from Multimedia to Kernel & Hardware: hardware terminology.