VPIX Problems/Questions...

[Rick Richardson]

In article <401 at ispi.UUCP> jbayer at ispi.UUCP (Jonathan Bayer) writes:
>In article <5980002 at hplsla.HP.COM> jeffh at hplsla.HP.COM (Jeff Harrell) writes:
>>You mean VPIX is not resetting the graphics mode...
>
>No. I meant what I said.  VP/ix can't get all the proper info from the
>card, therefore if you leave it in an unknown state it doesn't know
>about it, either the way it was, or the way it is.

Actually, one would think that all I/O to the registers are trapped by the
kernel.  This makes it possible to know exactly what state even the
write-only registers are in.  Whether or not this is being done
thoroughly is a question I can not answer.

However, the problem *may* not be VP/ix but rather the virtual terminals.
The following is specific to ISC's 386/ix, but the problems to be solved
are non-trivial and I could easily see SCO running into the same troubles.
I've noticed, on rare occasion, that regular UNIX programs that put
a virtual terminal into a graphics mode can also exhibit the problem
where switching out and then back leaves the screen blank.  This doesn't
happen very often, but I've seen it with X-windows and with
graphics programs written here that tweek EGA registers.

-- 
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