Background introduction to OpenGL programming easy to get started

OpenGL (Open Graphics Library) is a software interface for graphics hardware and an industry standard in this field. Graphics programmers can use these instructions to create high-quality interactive three-dimensional applications. The predecessor of OpenGL is the iris GL developed by SGI (Silicon Graphics) company for its graphics workstation. Although the IRIS GL is powerful but poorly ported, SGI company developed OpenGL based on the Iris GL.

OpenGL is a hardware-independent software interface. You can migrate between different platforms such as Windows 95, Windows NT, Unix, Linux, MacOS, and OS/2. Therefore, the software supporting OpenGL has good portability and can be widely used.

OpenGL is a network-transparent, network-capable. Even if the client and server are different types of computers OpenGL programs can also run on the network. This is useful for making large 3D graphics and animations. For example, "Toy Story", "Titanic" and other films of the computer stunt screen is through the application of OpenGL network function, using more than 120 graphics workstations work together to complete.

OpenGL development has been in a relatively slow situation, each version of the improvement of the new technology is very little, mostly just to make changes and improve the part. With the continuous development and improvement of DirectX, the advantages of OpenGL gradually lost, So far, although 3Dlabs advocates the development of the 2.0 version, in which many similar to the design of DirectX programmable unit, but the manufacturer's user awareness is not high, future OpenGL development prospects confused.

But OpenGL has many advantages, and these advantages can provide a lot of convenience for hardware and software developers. First of all, it is the industry standard, the broad technical support, is the only truly open, stable, and vendor-independent, multi-platform graphics standards. Second, reliability and portability. Third, allow the addition of new features. Four, you can run from a PC to a different level of a supercomputer machine. Four, easy to use, the general application of a few lines of code can be completed, and no need to consider the hardware. Five, with a large number of documents, examples available for reference.

Note that how to set up OpenGL on different platforms is somewhat different. To try to explain the image vividly, this article gives more than 10 examples, which are compiled and run in the Windows 2000 platform, Microsoft Visual C + + 6.0 environment.

This session will try to explain the examples in detail, explain what each line of code is doing, and even if you don't know anything about OpenGL or even Visual C + +, you can basically read these examples and write your own programs in imitation of these examples. So if you are a beginner, I think this article will be of great help to you, but if you are already a master of OpenGL programming, this article is too easy for you.