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OpenGL and X, Part 1:
An Introduction

Mark J. Kilgard
Silicon Graphics, Inc.

Abstract:

The OpenGL graphics system is a high-performance, window system independent 2D and 3D graphics interface. The technology was developed by SGI and is now controlled by the OpenGL Architecture Review Board. OpenGL's GLX extension integrates OpenGL with the X Window System. This article describes OpenGL's functionality and how it is used with X. A simple OpenGL program using Xlib is presented. OpenGL is compared and contrasted with PEX, a 3D graphics interface designed specifically for X. The two subsequent articles in this series describe how to integrate OpenGL with Xlib and Motif programs.

• 1 Introduction
  • 1.1 Design Philosophy
  • 1.2 History of OpenGL
• 2 OpenGL's Functionality
  • 2.1 Observations About Primitives
  • 2.2 Two Color Models
  • 2.3 Ancillary Buffers
    • 2.3.1 The Depth Buffer
    • 2.3.2 The Stencil Buffer
    • 2.3.3 The Accumulation Buffer
    • 2.3.4 Double Buffering
    • 2.3.5 Stereo
  • 2.4 Viewing
  • 2.5 Other Features
  • 2.6 The GLU Library
• 3 OpenGL's X Support
• 4 A Simple Example Using X
  • 4.1 Initialization
  • 4.2 Scene Update
• 5 Comparing OpenGL to PEX
  • 5.1 Subsets and Baselines
  • 5.2 Programming Interfaces
  • 5.3 Rendering Functionality
  • 5.4 Display Lists
  • 5.5 Portability
  • 5.6 Window System Dependency
• 6 Finding Out More
• A glxsimple.c
• References
• About this document ...