WoW and Miro bugs due to changes to xorg.conf for nVidia driver

[Alexander Gieg]

When I installed envy 0.9.9-0ubuntu6 some days ago, I allowed it to change my xorg.conf file (making a manual backup first, of course). The end result was that World of Warcraft and Miro, which were working before, started showing very odd behaviors. WoW would show garbled 3D objects, and Miro wouldn't show video, only play their audio. I managed to correct both problems by experimenting with xorg.conf options based on my backed up version by doing this:

a) Envy moved the line "Option "AddARGBGLXVisuals" "True"" from the "Device" section to the end of the "Screen" section. I moved it back to the "Device" section. This made WoW work again.

b) Envy added this whole section to the file:

Section "Extensions"
        Option "MIT-SHM" "no"
        Option "Composite" "Enable"
EndSection

By changing the value in the "Option "MIT-SHM"" line from "no" to "yes", Miro became able to play videos again.

I don't know whether newer versions of Envy change the xorg.conf file in the same way, I haven't tried them. In any case, I posted about this on UbuntuForums.org so as to help anyone else who'd experience this problem. Here's the link:

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?p=4203197

[Alberto Milone (albertomilone)]

According to NVIDIA AddARGBGLXVisuals can be specified either in the Screen or Device sections. For example Restricted Drivers Manager puts it in the Screen Section. I don't know why this should cause problems.

It is true that Envy adds these lines (if required):
Section "Extensions"
        Option "Composite" "Enable"
EndSection

However I don't know where this option comes from:
Option "MIT-SHM" "no"

Envy is not programmed to add that line. Maybe some other application modified your xorg.conf.

[Alexander Gieg (alexgieg)]

About the AddARGBGLVisuals line, maybe it's a problem in the way Wine handles OpenGL? A possibility is that both AddARGB* lines must be kept together in either the Device or the Screen section, because after the update the AddARGBVisuals remained in the Device section, while the AddARGBGLXVisuals went alone to the Screen one. I haven't read any of the nVidia documentation though, so I can be talking a lot of nonsense here. :)

In any case, this is how I have my Device section now, and it's working fine so far:

Section "Device"
        Identifier "nVidia GeForce 6800"
        Driver "nvidia"
        Busid "PCI:1:0:0"
        Option "AddARGBVisuals" "True"
        Option "AddARGBGLXVisuals" "True"
        Option "UseFastTLS" "2"
        Option "NoLogo" "True"
EndSection

And about the MIT-SHM line, please excuse me then. I've been changing heavily my system, installing and removing things, and something must have added this roughly at the same time I installed envy. I'll update my UbuntuForums post to make this clear.