Multi-Monitor

QNX Newsgroups (Archives) qdn.public.qnxrtp.photon
1

I got dual video to work ( with a custom driver ). The problem now is
that PtOsContainer used in our application do not work anymore. They
appear as black square.

I beleive there is confusion in offscreen video ram usage. Could the
the PtOsContainer be using the offscreen video ram of
the wrong video card? Anything we can do about that?


\

  • Mario
2

Mario Charest <mcharest@nozinformatic.com> wrote:

Here’s hopeing this gets out to you (not all of my posts have been it seems,
so please respond if you get it).

The PtOSContainer probably is going to the wrong driver, I bet if you drag
the window over to the other monitor it’ll draw fine. Unfortunately you
cannot do anything about that right now (at least with one photon server
running), this is one of the reasons why
multi-monitors aren’t supported yet (there are still a number of known issues
that need to be solved).

If it’s a viable solution for your product you could run two photon servers
and have an io-graphics for each one (wouldn’t be able to drag the window
back and forth between monitors though).

ie:

Photon -N /dev/photon &
Photon -N /dev/photon2 &
io-graphics -n /dev/photon &
io-graphics -n /dev/photon2 &

PHOTON=/dev/photon app1 &
PHOTON=/dev/photon2 app2 &
etc…


Sorry,
Dave Rempel




I got dual video to work ( with a custom driver ). The problem now is
that PtOsContainer used in our application do not work anymore. They
appear as black square.

I beleive there is confusion in offscreen video ram usage. Could the
the PtOsContainer be using the offscreen video ram of
the wrong video card? Anything we can do about that?

  • Mario
3

“David Rempel” <drempel@qnx.com> wrote in message
news:9d7157$m5p$1@nntp.qnx.com…

Mario Charest <> mcharest@nozinformatic.com> > wrote:

Here’s hopeing this gets out to you (not all of my posts have been it
seems,
so please respond if you get it).

Got it!

The PtOSContainer probably is going to the wrong driver, I bet if you drag
the window over to the other monitor it’ll draw fine. Unfortunately you
cannot do anything about that right now (at least with one photon server
running), this is one of the reasons why
multi-monitors aren’t supported yet (there are still a number of known
issues
that need to be solved).

If it’s a viable solution for your product you could run two photon
servers
and have an io-graphics for each one (wouldn’t be able to drag the window
back and forth between monitors though).

Cool, didn’t think about it myself. This should do just fine for
our need. We are saved :wink:

A big thanks !!!

ie:

Photon -N /dev/photon &
Photon -N /dev/photon2 &
io-graphics -n /dev/photon &
io-graphics -n /dev/photon2 &

PHOTON=/dev/photon app1 &
PHOTON=/dev/photon2 app2 &
etc…

Sorry,

Sorry??? for what. You should see what my programs don’t do yet ;o)

Dave Rempel




I got dual video to work ( with a custom driver ). The problem now is
that PtOsContainer used in our application do not work anymore. They
appear as black square.

I beleive there is confusion in offscreen video ram usage. Could the
the PtOsContainer be using the offscreen video ram of
the wrong video card? Anything we can do about that?


\

  • Mario
    \
4

Mario Charest <mcharest@deletezinformatic.com> wrote:


Cool, didn’t think about it myself. This should do just fine for
our need. We are saved > :wink:

A big thanks !!!

Glad it works!

Sorry,
Sorry??? for what. You should see what my programs don’t do yet ;o)

Ok, I take it back then :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye: (Canadian instinct to apologize came out
I guess ;P)

Dave Rempel

5

Is this a different way to get multi-monitor stuff to work?
(Possibly easier than hacking together trap files…)

David Rempel wrote:

Mario Charest <> mcharest@nozinformatic.com> > wrote:

Here’s hopeing this gets out to you (not all of my posts have been it seems,
so please respond if you get it).

The PtOSContainer probably is going to the wrong driver, I bet if you drag
the window over to the other monitor it’ll draw fine. Unfortunately you
cannot do anything about that right now (at least with one photon server
running), this is one of the reasons why
multi-monitors aren’t supported yet (there are still a number of known issues
that need to be solved).

If it’s a viable solution for your product you could run two photon servers
and have an io-graphics for each one (wouldn’t be able to drag the window
back and forth between monitors though).

ie:

Photon -N /dev/photon &
Photon -N /dev/photon2 &
io-graphics -n /dev/photon &
io-graphics -n /dev/photon2 &

PHOTON=/dev/photon app1 &
PHOTON=/dev/photon2 app2 &
etc…

Sorry,
Dave Rempel

I got dual video to work ( with a custom driver ). The problem now is
that PtOsContainer used in our application do not work anymore. They
appear as black square.

I beleive there is confusion in offscreen video ram usage. Could the
the PtOsContainer be using the offscreen video ram of
the wrong video card? Anything we can do about that?

  • Mario
6

Alex <acellarius@systems104.co.za> wrote:

Is this a different way to get multi-monitor stuff to work?
(Possibly easier than hacking together trap files…)

Yup, the limitation being then each monitor is an isolated photon session.
You will probably need to hack together you’re own ph script instead of hacking
together a trap file. You’ll run into fewer problems with this method once
it’s configured though.


David Rempel wrote:

Mario Charest <> mcharest@nozinformatic.com> > wrote:

Here’s hopeing this gets out to you (not all of my posts have been it seems,
so please respond if you get it).

The PtOSContainer probably is going to the wrong driver, I bet if you drag
the window over to the other monitor it’ll draw fine. Unfortunately you
cannot do anything about that right now (at least with one photon server
running), this is one of the reasons why
multi-monitors aren’t supported yet (there are still a number of known issues
that need to be solved).

If it’s a viable solution for your product you could run two photon servers
and have an io-graphics for each one (wouldn’t be able to drag the window
back and forth between monitors though).

ie:

Photon -N /dev/photon &
Photon -N /dev/photon2 &
io-graphics -n /dev/photon &
io-graphics -n /dev/photon2 &

PHOTON=/dev/photon app1 &
PHOTON=/dev/photon2 app2 &
etc…

Sorry,
Dave Rempel

I got dual video to work ( with a custom driver ). The problem now is
that PtOsContainer used in our application do not work anymore. They
appear as black square.

I beleive there is confusion in offscreen video ram usage. Could the
the PtOsContainer be using the offscreen video ram of
the wrong video card? Anything we can do about that?

  • Mario
7

I feel I should point out though that input might be a problem with this method as well (for a full blown photon desktop). Not sure how you’d do that (without two mice and two keyboards anyways ;P)


David Rempel <drempel@qnx.com> wrote:

Alex <> acellarius@systems104.co.za> > wrote:
Is this a different way to get multi-monitor stuff to work?
(Possibly easier than hacking together trap files…)

Yup, the limitation being then each monitor is an isolated photon session.
You will probably need to hack together you’re own ph script instead of hacking
together a trap file. You’ll run into fewer problems with this method once
it’s configured though.



David Rempel wrote:

Mario Charest <> mcharest@nozinformatic.com> > wrote:

Here’s hopeing this gets out to you (not all of my posts have been it seems,
so please respond if you get it).

The PtOSContainer probably is going to the wrong driver, I bet if you drag
the window over to the other monitor it’ll draw fine. Unfortunately you
cannot do anything about that right now (at least with one photon server
running), this is one of the reasons why
multi-monitors aren’t supported yet (there are still a number of known issues
that need to be solved).

If it’s a viable solution for your product you could run two photon servers
and have an io-graphics for each one (wouldn’t be able to drag the window
back and forth between monitors though).

ie:

Photon -N /dev/photon &
Photon -N /dev/photon2 &
io-graphics -n /dev/photon &
io-graphics -n /dev/photon2 &

PHOTON=/dev/photon app1 &
PHOTON=/dev/photon2 app2 &
etc…

Sorry,
Dave Rempel

I got dual video to work ( with a custom driver ). The problem now is
that PtOsContainer used in our application do not work anymore. They
appear as black square.

I beleive there is confusion in offscreen video ram usage. Could the
the PtOsContainer be using the offscreen video ram of
the wrong video card? Anything we can do about that?

  • Mario
8

David Rempel wrote:

Alex <> acellarius@systems104.co.za> > wrote:
Is this a different way to get multi-monitor stuff to work?
(Possibly easier than hacking together trap files…)

Yup, the limitation being then each monitor is an isolated photon session.
You will probably need to hack together you’re own ph script instead of hacking
together a trap file. You’ll run into fewer problems with this method once
it’s configured though.

I’m looking for an alternative to the crt trap merge method, which
hopefully is more likely to work than the merged single Photon
method.

Would you care to write up a how-to for the QDN knowledge base.
I’m in the middle of this and would be happy to debug
it for you :slight_smile:
Something along the lines of
http://qdn.qnx.com/support/bok/solution.qnx?9490
I’ve tried that method and didn’t have too much success
with the particular PCI VGA adapters I was working with.
I also had the hardware at QNX at tech support and they were
not able to get it working either.

Your point of the input in the next post is valid, a trade off
as always…
PS I wonder if there’s a how-to of running more than 1
keyboard & mouse? I will have a look so long.

9

Ok, I’ll do a how to when I get some time. It still may not work with
all video cards though. If the driver(s) rely on the video bios to
intialize the card(s), you could still run into trouble. Patch B drivers
probably won’t work at all, but the next release should improve this area
with those types of drivers (but so far some old matrox’s and s3’s don’t work)
so you may have better luck with those types of cards then.

if it doesn’t work because of the bios then
you probably would want to either a) Make a custom engineering request for
drivers that don’t rely on the bios for your cards, b) download the graphics
ddk and try to do one yourself, c) get a cards that our drivers don’t require
the bios for :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

To be certain check out http://qdn.qnx.com/support/hardware/platform/video.html

If the driver needs the bios to operate it will be noted there.

(now, I’ll mail the previos post to myself so I remember to do a how to ;P)


TTYL
drempel

Alex <acellarius@systems104.co.za> wrote:

David Rempel wrote:

Alex <> acellarius@systems104.co.za> > wrote:
Is this a different way to get multi-monitor stuff to work?
(Possibly easier than hacking together trap files…)

Yup, the limitation being then each monitor is an isolated photon session.
You will probably need to hack together you’re own ph script instead of hacking
together a trap file. You’ll run into fewer problems with this method once
it’s configured though.

I’m looking for an alternative to the crt trap merge method, which
hopefully is more likely to work than the merged single Photon
method.

Would you care to write up a how-to for the QDN knowledge base.
I’m in the middle of this and would be happy to debug
it for you > :slight_smile:
Something along the lines of
http://qdn.qnx.com/support/bok/solution.qnx?9490
I’ve tried that method and didn’t have too much success
with the particular PCI VGA adapters I was working with.
I also had the hardware at QNX at tech support and they were
not able to get it working either.

Your point of the input in the next post is valid, a trade off
as always…
PS I wonder if there’s a how-to of running more than 1
keyboard & mouse? I will have a look so long.

10

Hi…

I wonder if you have done any thing about this? Will the upcoming
release handle multiple monitors?

Bests…

Miguel.

David Rempel wrote:

Ok, I’ll do a how to when I get some time. It still may not work with
all video cards though. If the driver(s) rely on the video bios to
intialize the card(s), you could still run into trouble. Patch B drivers
probably won’t work at all, but the next release should improve this area
with those types of drivers (but so far some old matrox’s and s3’s don’t work)
so you may have better luck with those types of cards then.

if it doesn’t work because of the bios then
you probably would want to either a) Make a custom engineering request for
drivers that don’t rely on the bios for your cards, b) download the graphics
ddk and try to do one yourself, c) get a cards that our drivers don’t require
the bios for :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

To be certain check out > http://qdn.qnx.com/support/hardware/platform/video.html

If the driver needs the bios to operate it will be noted there.

(now, I’ll mail the previos post to myself so I remember to do a how to ;P)

–

my opinions are mine, only mine, solely mine, and they are not related
in any possible way to the institution(s) in which I study and work.

Miguel Simon
Research Engineer
School of Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering
University of Oklahoma
http://www.amerobotics.ou.edu/
http://www.saic.com