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+--- Thread: Port XBMC to PS3 (PlayStation 3) to run on Linux ("Other OS") or natively on GameOS? (/showthread.php?tid=21849)
- vibe666 - 2007-12-12 14:45
Gamester17 Wrote:None of Team-XBMC developers have the low-level skills required to make such OpenGL device drivers themselves, thus will have to wait and see if someone else produces them for Linux on the PS3.
ah well, here's hoping.
even if it were possible to get it up to the speed of the old xbox running xbmc that would be quite something. I'd finally be able to retire my faithful old xbox and have one less box under the telly.
i know we expect the world of you guys and you get little thanks for it (thanks btw
) but it just feels (to the less techy of us) that it is so close to being possible. so close yet so far it would seem. 
- wHack - 2007-12-14 17:31
Actually you don't need Opengl and having an Opengl abstraction layer would be a resource waste. You don't need nearly all of the Opengl functionality. Only specific parts alot of which would probably be easily converted over to the rsx specific calls that these guys are using. Like scaling and alphablended overlays, and the other normar gui stuff. Some of which would require more work for instance de-interlacing. And colorspace conversion but these guys have already talked about including some colorspace conversion and mentioned it's not to dificult to code. It seems to me that if you guys aquired a few devs who understood how to write stuff at this lower level the conversion would be quite possible and much cleaner and more efficient than using a full featured OpenGL layer. However if you don't have those dev's it's probably a very very tricky task. But as it is they seem to have alot of the functionality you want from OpenGL already in place.
I could be wrong about this though as I don't know either XBMC's code nor their code very well but it just seems this way from what I've read of both.
- wHack - 2007-12-14 17:36
Now that I think about it though I'm sure if the XBMC linux dev's had the time they could get pretty much all the info they needed from IronPeter and Glaurung as well as more specific support in the ps3 rsx driver code for some of the features XBMC needs. That might make it a little easier.
Just a thought.
- wHack - 2007-12-14 17:57
On one last note waiting for someone to write full OpenGL for ps3 linux will likely take quite some time as IronPeter and Glaurung have no intention of even trying to do it. This is because they have largely based their code off of nouveau who is just barely scratching the surface of OpenGL, and who also aren't to concerned with it at the moment. /largely because it's a huge undertaking with a massive amount of work to be done, and they know that on the ps3 front alot of it can be achieved more clealy with direct calls. The whole point of OpenGL being to utilize one instruction set for various hardware platforms, and the ps3 being a very specific individual platform. The only reason to port OpenGL to ps3 rsx would be to simplify the porting of existing OpenGL apps for people who don't want to learn the direct calls. And their goal being to enable custom ps3 development optimized for the platform. The two goals jus don't meet. OpenGL is too much work for a non-optimal solution. Thus noone is even attempting to bring OpenGL to the ps3. I'm sure someone will try at some point but it's a long way off as the curent development is focused on the direct approach. It also seems this would be the best approach for XBMC if the devs where to make the move to ps3. Which I can only hope and pray they will decide to do.
- Gamester17 - 2007-12-15 01:11
wHack Wrote:It seems to me that if you guys aquired a few devs who understood how to write stuff at this lower level the conversion would be quite possible and much cleaner and more efficient than using a full featured OpenGL layer.Again, we do not have any programmers with such skills, and simply aquiring a few developers with such skills is not a simple as you might think, (I refer to the fact that when we announced the Team-XBMC was looking for Linux developers and that news even got slashdottet we still only gained one new developer since then, from the very beginming of the Linux port project). You have to remember that all developers (and all other members) of Team-XBMC are unpaid volunteers who only work on XBMC in their spare time as a hobby for fun, and they only spend time on features/functions that interest them personally, ...they do not work on XBMC for you, the end-users of XBMC, they work on XBMC for themselves.
You and I can not force anyone on Team-XBMC to work on something, all we can do as non-programmers is try to lobby good ideas and hope that someone with the skills required find those ideas interesting enough for them to take a personal interest.
As for the technical side of the PS3 and the RSX (PS3 GPU); I suppose you are right that XBMC do not need full OpenGL support, what is 'only' really needed is for RSX hardware accelerestion via libSDL (SDL = Simple DirectMedia Layer) for all the things you mentioned like YUV to RGB colorspace conversion, scaling, alphablended overlays, deinterlacing, and non-power of two textures for the GUI (using NPOT saves a lot of texture memory) ...all of which could probably be achived via direct calls to the RSX from libSDL. So XBMC request what it needs from libSDL and libSDL and how libSDL provides that XBMC do not care, ...but again, I do not think that the Team-XBMC developers have the necessary low-level skills to add RSX support to libSDL, that someone else would have to do.
Feel free to try to lobby support RSX support for libSDL from third-party developers elseware
- d4rk - 2007-12-15 01:30
wHack Wrote:It seems to me that if you guys aquired a few devs who understood how to write stuff at this lower level the conversion would be quite possible and much cleaner and more efficient than using a full featured OpenGL layer.
Once libps3rsx is more mature and the API is somewhat finalized, it might be something I (personally) would consider, until then there's no point starting a new rendering interface only to have the API change every few weeks. I don't think any of the other devs care about a PS3 port. In addition, the priority now is to stabilize the Linux port and make it feature complete. There's still work to be done but it's getting there. Maybe by the time the Linux port is stable, libps3rsx would be as well and it's something that could be considered.
- vibe666 - 2007-12-17 04:22
from my (admittedly very) limited understanding of all this, the Linux PS3 version of XBMC would still be based on Ubuntu. Would it not make sense to use the PS3 optimised Yellow Dog distro? AFAIK it already has access to all the relevent hardware on the PS3 t allow it to take full advantage of the power of the console. or maybe I just don't understand how it all works. :/
- Gamester17 - 2007-12-17 12:57
vibe666 Wrote:from my (admittedly very) limited understanding of all this, the Linux PS3 version of XBMC would still be based on Ubuntu. Would it not make sense to use the PS3 optimised Yellow Dog distro? AFAIK it already has access to all the relevent hardware on the PS3 t allow it to take full advantage of the power of the console. or maybe I just don't understand how it all works. :/Any discussion of exacly which actual Linux distrobution XBMC would be using if ever portet to the PS3 is a moot point at this stage, proper hardware accelerated 3D graphic support is first needed for the PS3 RSX GPU (for any Linux distrobution), ...thus all any one of us can do is wait for libps3rsx (or similar library/driver) to became mature enough, or if you got the skills then you can help those projects out.
- wHack - 2007-12-17 19:48
Gamester17 please forgive me if I gave the wrong impression. I really wasn't saying getting a dev or too with the necesary skills would be easy or that anyone involved with XBMC should do anything to try to make a ps3 port happen. I'm well aware of the fact that XBMC is a non-paid volunteer project and would not expect the devs to do anything for me or anyone else but themselves. I was mearly trying to point out if the team had devs willing intresed and capable the underlying tools necessary to make such a port are already in existance. Just pointing out that it could be done and it could theoretically be done now if someone wanted too. If my programing skills were good enough I'd probably be playing with it myself. However one other point behind my post was to let it be stated in an official forum and hopefully get some verification that it could be done now without having to wait for OpenGL for ps3 linux which could take years, this was partially with the hope that it might possibly be seen by someone who was interested in andcapable of doing it. Over and ove again I've seen the idea quickly shot down as undoable at the moment which very well could cause someone who hasn't paid attention to the libps3rsx project to just shy away or wait for OpenGL under the assumption it might come soon if they already have direct access. I really didn't mean to sound like I was pressuring anyone or telling them what to do.
d4rk well I hope that they do have it mostly solidified when XBMC for linux is coming to completion. And it would be awesome if you did put some work into it and even more so if it came to fruition at some point. I can only hope someone will. On the ps3 XBMC would have so much room to grow if ps3 knowledgable programmers got in there and optimized XBMC to work with the SPE's I'm fairly sure the performance and capabilities could be amazing. And I know neither project is done at this point and I probably wouldn't do it now either if I could. Or at least nothing more than some fairly simple proof of concept stuff.
And thanks to both of you for giving a little hope to us ps3 XBMC dreamers.
YOU can help too! - Gamester17 - 2007-12-17 20:40
wHack Wrote:thanks to both of you for giving a little hope to us ps3 XBMC dreamers.If you and other 'non-developers' want to do something to help now, today, in order to possible make this PS3 port happen sooner, then again; feel free to independetly try to lobby for RSX support for libSDL in libps3rsx (and vice versa) from third-party developers/programmers elseware, such as other projects, community forums, and sites on the internet, or even friends and family, or friends of friends and family if you/they know any developers skilled and interested in this.
...like for example other open source software projects that uses SDL to accelerate graphic rendering
(remember that a few softwares also use SDL indirectly via ScummVM, Pygame, and DOSBox, etc., ...my guess is also that a lot of people would want to see game-console emulators in PS3 linux and any such emulator software would also most likely be built on-top of the SDL library to run on the PS3)Just make sure you do research before and then ask the smart way
The more poeple who show an interest, the more likely that the right people will activly join in the effort
