Anssi Hannula wrote:
>  
>> In
>> this case it looks like it's being used to allow mesa and the various
>> nvidia drivers to each blissfully assume that everybody else uses the
>> same version of the library they need.
>>  
>
> I don't understand what you are saying here.
>
> NVIDIA-provided libGL.so.1 provides a NVIDIA implementation of the
> OpenGL API, and it only works when used with proprietary NVIDIA X.org
> driver.
>
>  
>> Or is the point that everyone using libGL *has* to be using the same
>> version as the video driver ? In that case, alternatives makes more
>> sense.
>>  
>
> I don't understand. libGL users have to use the same version of libGL as
> video drivers? That doesn't make any sense to me.
>  

So you're saying that nvidia libGL only works in conjunction with the
nvidia proprietary driver. Is it also true that no other libGL works
with the nvidia proprietary driver ? Because if that's true, then all
users of libGL on an nvidia proprietary system must also use the nvidia
proprietary libGL, no ? And if it's not true, then why use alternatives
to make them use it ?

If the only thing that *needs* the nvidia proprietary libGL is the
nvidia driver, why doesn't it provide a package which provides
libGLNVidia.so.1, and require that instead ?


>  
>> But I have two cooker systems, one with an nvidia card and one
>> without. Mesa is installed on both. On the nvidia system,
>> /etc/alternatives/gl_conf is symlinked to /etc/nvidia-current/ld.so.conf
>> and on the other it is symlinked to /etc/ld.so.conf.d/GL/standard.conf.
>> So how is mesa expected to work on both ?
>>  
>
> Mesa libGL only works on the non-nvidia system. On the NVIDIA system the
> NVIDIA-provided libGL is used instead.
>  

I understand that, but my question is why we use alternatives to force
mesa on the nvidia system to use the nvidia-provided libGL. If the mesa
libGL truly does not work with the nvidia card, the the statement that
"everyone using libGL *has* to be using the same version as the video
driver" is true. If not, then forcing mesa (or anything else) to use
nvidia's libGL via alternatives runs the risk of breaking something if
nvidia *doesn't* keep in synch with the "standard" libGL, no ?