Forums » MacOS X
Final OpenGL 2.0 Specification Announced
Yeah I know, Vendetta won't use OpenGL 2.0 soon (or maybe even ever). But still, I thought I'd bug the devs about it. Here you go!
http://www.opengl.org/
Here's a brief overview:
OpenGL® Shading Language has been extensively field tested for a year within the proven ARB standardization process. Potential applications include cinematic quality images for games, more realistic imagery for training and simulation, better analysis tools for medical visualization, and more true-to-life simulated environments for designing and styling manufactured products.
Since its introduction in 2003, OpenGL Shading Language has become the most widely supported shading language for developing interactive graphics and visualization applications, with implementations for UNIX®, Microsoft® Windows®, Linux®, and other operating systems. This wide compatibility enables developers to readily move their work across most major commercial operating systems and hardware platforms. OpenGL 2.0 fully supports all applications written under the previous versions of the specification.
And some key features:
• Programmable shading. With the new release, both OpenGL Shading Language and its APIs are now core features of OpenGL. New functionality includes the ability to create shader and program objects; and the ability to write vertex and fragment shaders in OpenGL Shading Language.
• Multiple render targets that enable programmable shaders to write different values to multiple output buffers in a single pass.
• Non-power-of-two textures for all texture targets, thereby supporting rectangular textures and reducing memory consumption.
• Two-sided stencil, with the ability to define stencil functionality for the front and back faces of primitives, improving performance of shadow volume and constructive solid geometry rendering algorithms.
• Point sprites, which replace point texture coordinates with texture coordinates interpolated across the point. This allows drawing points as customized textures, useful for particle systems.
http://www.opengl.org/
Here's a brief overview:
OpenGL® Shading Language has been extensively field tested for a year within the proven ARB standardization process. Potential applications include cinematic quality images for games, more realistic imagery for training and simulation, better analysis tools for medical visualization, and more true-to-life simulated environments for designing and styling manufactured products.
Since its introduction in 2003, OpenGL Shading Language has become the most widely supported shading language for developing interactive graphics and visualization applications, with implementations for UNIX®, Microsoft® Windows®, Linux®, and other operating systems. This wide compatibility enables developers to readily move their work across most major commercial operating systems and hardware platforms. OpenGL 2.0 fully supports all applications written under the previous versions of the specification.
And some key features:
• Programmable shading. With the new release, both OpenGL Shading Language and its APIs are now core features of OpenGL. New functionality includes the ability to create shader and program objects; and the ability to write vertex and fragment shaders in OpenGL Shading Language.
• Multiple render targets that enable programmable shaders to write different values to multiple output buffers in a single pass.
• Non-power-of-two textures for all texture targets, thereby supporting rectangular textures and reducing memory consumption.
• Two-sided stencil, with the ability to define stencil functionality for the front and back faces of primitives, improving performance of shadow volume and constructive solid geometry rendering algorithms.
• Point sprites, which replace point texture coordinates with texture coordinates interpolated across the point. This allows drawing points as customized textures, useful for particle systems.
Heh, well, I'm sure Apple will take their sweet time getting ogl2 for macosx.
Also, using all of the opengl2 stuff will probably just make the game even slower and it wouldn't run on as many different hardware.
Someday though.
Also, using all of the opengl2 stuff will probably just make the game even slower and it wouldn't run on as many different hardware.
Someday though.
So true. Not only is OpenGL 2.0 going to be the first version of this major overhaul (bugs anyone?), it also has the potential to kill framerates due to limited customizability. Mac users aren't given any control panels or menus for their GPU to enable/disable specific portions of OpenGL, the addition of such eyecandy extensions that didn't exist before could easily kill performance. The best we can do for now is rummage around the config.ini files associated with each game and look for these specific extensions and turn 'em off manually. But that's not always the case.
But I wonder, would it be possible to customize your GPU or OpenGL settings through the Terminal by accessing the kext or preference files associated with each one? I'm not very educated with the usage of the Terminal, but if I can have that level of customizability that PC users get with their graphics card, I'd certainly be willing to learn it for that purpose alone.
Anyway, I certainly hope that they take their time with development and make OpenGL 2.0 the best that it can be without sacrificing performance (perhaps even speeding it up somehow). Maybe sometime in the future they'll actually be able to compete with DirectX. It's a shame Microsoft won't get off their high horses and make DirectX available to Macs also. Hell will freeze over before that happens though.
But I wonder, would it be possible to customize your GPU or OpenGL settings through the Terminal by accessing the kext or preference files associated with each one? I'm not very educated with the usage of the Terminal, but if I can have that level of customizability that PC users get with their graphics card, I'd certainly be willing to learn it for that purpose alone.
Anyway, I certainly hope that they take their time with development and make OpenGL 2.0 the best that it can be without sacrificing performance (perhaps even speeding it up somehow). Maybe sometime in the future they'll actually be able to compete with DirectX. It's a shame Microsoft won't get off their high horses and make DirectX available to Macs also. Hell will freeze over before that happens though.