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May 11, 2024 – The biggest maker of graphics cards, NVIDIA, has done something very important by making its Linux graphics kernel parts available as free software.
The Release That Is Open Source
NVIDIA said on Wednesday that its Linux graphics kernel modules are now available under both the GPL and the MIT license². That means anyone can now look at NVIDIA’s code, and programmers can send in fixes and new features to make the drivers better¬.
What It Means for Linux Gaming
Linux has always been harder to play games on than Windows because NVIDIA drivers don’t work well on Linux. This move, on the other hand, is likely to make things very different².
What Linux Developers Had to Say
Canonical (which makes Ubuntu Linux), SUSE, and Red Hat (which makes Fedora Linux) have all praised NVIDIA’s move to finally make its Linux graphics drivers open source². This change should make installations easier and safer for all Ubuntu users, including AI/ML coders, players, and cloud users².
The Catch
Even though the news is good, there are a few things that should make you less excited². A lot of the important code for images isn’t open source³. It looks like NVIDIA put a lot of its own code into the software on its graphics cards. This code works with the open-source code³.
Bottom Line
It’s a big step forward for NVIDIA that they have decided to make their Linux GPU drivers open source. It will be interesting to see how this change affects Linux gamers and the tech industry as a whole as NVIDIA keeps coming up with new ideas.
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