Direct Rendering Manager

The Direct Rendering Manager (DRM) is a subsystem of the Linux kernel responsible for interfacing with GPUs of modern video cards. DRM exposes an API that user space programs can use to send commands and data to the GPU, and perform operations such as configuring the mode setting of the display. DRM was first developed as the kernel space component of the X Server's Direct Rendering Infrastructure, but since then it has been used by other graphic stack alternatives such as Wayland.

User space programs can use the DRM API to command the GPU to do hardware accelerated 3D rendering, video decoding as well as GPGPU computing.

Overview

The Linux Kernel already had an API called fbdev allowing to manage the framebuffer of a graphics adapter, but it couldn't be used to handle the needs of modern 3D accelerated GPU based video cards. These type of cards usually require setting and managing a command queue in the card's memory (Video RAM) to dispatch commands to the GPU, and also they need a proper management of the buffers and free space of the Video RAM itself. Initially user space programs (such as the X Server) directly managed these resources, but these programs usually acted as if they were the only ones with access to the card's resources. When two or more programs tried to control the same video card at the same time, and set its resources each one in its own way, most times they ended catastrophically.

Driver

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Driver circuit

In electronics, a driver is an electrical circuit or other electronic component used to control another circuit or component, such as a high-power transistor, liquid crystal display (LCD), and numerous others.

They are usually used to regulate current flowing through a circuit or is used to control the other factors such as other components, some devices in the circuit. The term is often used, for example, for a specialized integrated circuit that controls high-power switches in switched-mode power converters. An amplifier can also be considered a driver for loudspeakers, or a constant voltage circuit that keeps an attached component operating within a broad range of input voltages.

Typically the driver stage(s) of a circuit requires different characteristics to other circuit stages. For example in a transistor power amplifier, typically the driver circuit requires current gain, often the ability to discharge the following transistor bases rapidly, and low output impedance to avoid or minimize distortion.

Device driver

In computing, a device driver (commonly referred to as a driver) is a computer program that operates or controls a particular type of device that is attached to a computer. A driver provides a software interface to hardware devices, enabling operating systems and other computer programs to access hardware functions without needing to know precise details of the hardware being used.

A driver communicates with the device through the computer bus or communications subsystem to which the hardware connects. When a calling program invokes a routine in the driver, the driver issues commands to the device. Once the device sends data back to the driver, the driver may invoke routines in the original calling program. Drivers are hardware dependent and operating-system-specific. They usually provide the interrupt handling required for any necessary asynchronous time-dependent hardware interface.

Purpose

Device drivers simplify programming by acting as translator between a hardware device and the applications or operating systems that use it. Programmers can write the higher-level application code independently of whatever specific hardware the end-user is using.

KMS

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Kurzweil K250

The Kurzweil K250 a.k.a. "Kurzweil 250", "K250" or "K-250", manufactured by Kurzweil Music Systems was the first electronic musical instrument which produced sound derived from sampled sounds burned onto integrated circuits known as read-only memory (ROM), without the requirement for any type of disk drive. Acoustic sounds from brass, percussion, string and woodwind instruments as well as sounds created using waveforms from oscillators were utilized. Primarily designed for the professional musician, it was conceived and invented by Raymond Kurzweil, original founder of Kurzweil Computer Products, Inc., Kurzweil Music Systems and Kurzweil Educational Systems with consultation from Stevie Wonder; Lyle Mays, an American jazz pianist; Alan R. Pearlman, founder of ARP Instruments Inc.; and Robert Moog, inventor of the Moog synthesizer.

History

In the mid-1970s, Raymond Kurzweil invented the first multi-font reading machine for the blind, consisted of the earliest CCD flat-bed scanner and text-to-speech synthesizer. In 1976, Stevie Wonder heard about the demonstration of this new machine on the Today Show, and later he became the user of first production unit, Kurzweil Reading Machine. It was the beginning of a long-term relationship between them.