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docs/drivers/virgl.rst

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+VirGL
+=====
+
+What is VirGL?
+--------------
+
+VirGL is a virtual 3D GPU for use inside QEMU virtual machines, that
+allows the guest operating system to use the capabilities of the host GPU
+to accelerate 3D rendering. The plan is to have a guest GPU that is fully
+independent of the host GPU.
+
+What exactly does it entail?
+----------------------------
+
+The project entails creating a virtual 3D capable graphics card for
+virtual machines running inside QEMU. The design of this card is based
+around the concepts of Gallium3D to make writing Mesa and (eventually)
+Direct3D drivers for it easy. The card natively uses the Gallium TGSI
+intermediate representation for its shaders. The implementation of
+rendering for the card is done in the host system as part of QEMU and is
+implemented purely on OpenGL so you can get accelerated rendering on any
+sufficiently capable card/driver combination.
+
+The project also consists of a complete Linux guest stack, composed of a
+Linux kernel KMS driver, X.org 2D DDX driver and Mesa 3D driver.
+
+Current status
+--------------
+
+* Many pieces are now upstreamed in various projects.
+* Kernel Linux 4.2 contains the modesetting only drivers. Linux 4.4
+  contains the 3D supported pieces.
+* Mesa main contains the VirGL 3D driver.
+* QEMU 2.4 contained the initial virtio-gpu with no acceleration
+  support. QEMU 2.5 contains 3D support only with the GTK3 frontend with
+  GL enabled.
+* The virglrenderer library seems mostly API stable.
+* Limited environment renderer (GLES2)
+
+So what can it do now?
+^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
+
+Run a desktop and most 3D games I've thrown at it.
+
+Scope
+-----
+
+The project is currently investigating the desktop virtualization use case
+only. This use case is where the viewer, host and guest are all running on
+the same machine (i.e. workstation or laptop). Some areas are in scope for
+future investigation but not being looked at, at this time.
+
+Future scope
+^^^^^^^^^^^^
+
+* Remoting rendering using a codec solution.
+* Windows guest, Direct3D drivers.
+* Other architectures
+
+Out of scope
+^^^^^^^^^^^^
+
+* Passing through GPUs or subsets of GPU capabilities.
+
+Repos
+-----
+
+All upstream parts are being developed upstream.
+
+virglrenderer: the GL renderer https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/virgl/virglrenderer
+
+Authors and Contributors
+------------------------
+
+VirGL is a project undertaken by Dave Airlie at Red Hat. It builds on lots
+of open source work in a number of projects, primarily the Gallium 3D code
+from the Mesa project.
+
+Support or Contact
+------------------
+
+mailing list: [email protected]
+
+https://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/virglrenderer-devel
+
+IRC: `#virgil3d on OFTC <irc://irc.oftc.net/virgil3d>`__.