                   V OpenGL support

		    November 21, 1998





OpenGL support has now been included in the regular release

of V (starting with V 1.20). Is should work exactly like

the previous version included separately.



However, you should now also be able to include regular

V Canvases, as well as OpenGL canvases. In the previous

version, the OpenGl canvas was a replacement for the

standard vCanvasPane. In this version, it is properly

derived from vCanvasPane.



I've tried to make the OpenGL canvas easy to use. The

best way (for now) to learn how to use the class is

to look at the sample programs included here.

To use it, compile your code, and link it

with the V library and the V OpenGL library.



This version has been tested on Linux with Mesa 2.6.

It used to run on Silicon Graphics machines, and there

is no reason to assume that has changed.



When I installed Mesa, I had to add some symbolic

links to have it link like standard OpenGL, but you

could also change the library switches in the Makefiles.



There are a several of samples, some derived from GLUT,

others from the Mesa distribution. Each sample is included

in a separate directory. There are mingw32 makefiles for MS-Windows

for all examples, and Linux makefiles for many.



The documentation for vBaseGLCanvasPane is still incomplete. The

best way to use it is to look at <v/vbglcnv.h> and the examples.



I've only been able to get the Windows version to work correctly

under mingw32 and Borland C++ 5.0. Microsoft C++ 4.0 couldn't find

the proper link libraries. If someone knows how to get this

problem solved, please let me know.



The Mingw32 distribution requires proper .h files. They are included

in the gnuwin32 directory. The OpenGL header

files I provide are edited to remove references to CALLBACK

parameters, which means the tesselation stuff doesn't work.



The Windows version doesn't seem to support Indexed color mode,

even though the definitions are there, and some code looks

like it generates a correct graphics context. The problem

for now seems to be there is no equivalent of glutSetColor to

set a color index. Does ANYONE in the whole world actually

use Indexed color? If so, then I'll look at glut and see if

I can add indexed color support.



I am working on developing a new vOpenGLCanvasPane class with a

V user. The new class will have built in support for some

vector stuff and some lighting stuff. Would anyone like

some of the glut shapes: spheres, cubes, etc? They shouldn't be

too hard to add, but I don't know if they really get used.



Thanks,



Bruce Wampler

bruce@objectcentral.com

