In the beginning…
Linux still talks to LCD monitors via a CRT controller interface. Find out where that came from!
P orting the X Windows System from (various flavours of) Unix to Linux was in some ways key to its success. A GUI, no matter how primitive, enables richer applications to be developed and richer content to be produced. In the mid-90s the only displays users needed to worry about were CRT monitors. Y’know, those heavy, retina-burning monsters whose depth was at least that of their screen’s diagonal. These work by sweeping a beam (okay, three beams if you want colour) of electrons back and forth with a given frequency, and then up and down with a slightly lesser frequency. These are the horizontal and vertical scan rates