I was thinking if could be possible for someone who knows how to create patchscript to explain the procedure, so other useres could learn and help to crerate patchscripts for new drivers. I was thinking this because many new drivers are comeing out and if more people could help, it would be easier to keep up. And as Unwinder said: It would be nice (and helpful) if rivatuner woud have softmodding subsection in the forum so modding threads would seperate from normal rivatuner threads. (so both sides win)
Sorry, but I doubt that a person who is really able to analyze a driver and create a patch needs any guide. As well as I'm sure that a person having zero reverse engineering skills will be absolutely unable to create a patch even with extremely detailed guide. You must be able to think yourself in order to create it, not to follow the guide blindly.
Ok I did have in mind total step by step guide that could anyone do, because that would be impossible. But I belive that there are people who have enough knowledge, but don't have time/will to start analyzeing driver form scratch and would find some hints useful and people who have some knowledge, but not enough, and they could do it if they got some directions. Who knows maybe there is someone who is willing to put much effort to learn if he gets directions on where to start. ..cuz everybody has had to start from zero once. yes I know that this suggestion is very optimistic and that result would not be hundreds of people creating their own patchscripts, but maybe 3-5 people and everyone counts, right? PS: there goes one saying: give a man a fish; you have fed him for today. Teach a man to fish; and you have fed him for a lifetime or give a man a fish; you have fed him for today. Teach a man to fish; and you will not have to listen to his incessant whining about how hungry he is
Once again: it is almost impossible to teach a person to create a patches if he doesn't have basic knowledges. To be able to write SoftR9x00 yourself you should: 1) Understand assembly language perfectly 2) Understand display driver architecture 3) Understand some ATI hardware architecture related specifics 4) Be able to find all the places in the driver, where it accesses PCI device ID. 5) Be able to find and neutralize all the protections ATI driver writers left to make your life harder. 6) Be able to change some parts of the driver's code to make it to "see" new PCI DeviceID instead of the real one. 7) And only then to understand patch script's format and write a script, which changes source hex strings (which are in fact the portions of code you've analyzed) with new ones.
Dear Sir, Actually, I think that a simple guide to patchscript syntax could help for the point 4). Reverse engineering of a previous driver patchscript can help acquiring experience about where to find these places, and this could be a good base to start for new drivers modding. I'm interested too. Best Regards Adalberto EDIT: well I think Src is source hex sequence, which is replaced by Dst sequence, while I guess Scm is an ignore mask (FF=check 00=ignore) Correct?
