Yesterday, the lads over at Phoronix began coverage of AMD’s release of the code and documentation necessary to write drivers for AMD 3000 and 4000-series GPUs on Linux.

The process has been arduous and technically-challenging for AMD. It has been difficult for the firm to release concise documentation that will let programmers do their task without revealing their hand for future GPUs.

“John Bridgman and Alex Deucher have been working on deciding what code or documentation is needed for programming, sanitize it of any information not relevant to bringing up the 3D engine, remove any details concerning future ATI hardware, and then getting all of this work cleared by AMD’s lead software and hardware architects so that it can be publicly released without any NDAs or other string attached,” writes Michael Larabel of Phoronix.

The complete specification, expected in a month’s time when AMD execs return from holiday, is extremely dense. Latest documents contain information on nearly 200 registers, or specialized portions of memory each suited to quickly execute certain types of code.

“What’s encompassed by today’s drop is a working DRM (for the newbie, Direct Rendering Manager, not to be confused with Digital Rights Management), working EXA acceleration, an initial X-Video implementation and the working r600_demo program. There was about 180 pages of 3D register specifications set to be released, but all of the AMD officials didn’t come to a consensus before leaving for the holidays,” Larabel writes.

While there is more work to be done, AMD’s dedication to the FOSS community is being shown in an exciting way. The contribution of open source GPU specifications and technical guidance is playing a pivotal role in 3D acceleration with ATI cards on Linux.  As Larabel writes, “there is now nothing (other than time) preventing open-source developers from enabling 3D support across all available ATI graphics processors.”