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gerrit-public.fairphone.software / fp2-dev / platform / external / mesa3d / 9bd39eb3af492f3fe314dc7432f89109264f13f6 / . / docs / intro.html
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3<TITLE>Mesa Introduction</TITLE>
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7<BODY>
Brian Paul0b27ace2003-03-08 17:38:57 +0000[diff] [blame]8
9<H1>Introduction</H1>
10
11<p>
Brian4d864b02007-04-04 09:33:12 -0600[diff] [blame]12Mesa is an open-source implementation of the
13<a href="http://www.opengl.org/" target="_parent">OpenGL</a> specification -
14a system for rendering interactive 3D graphics.
Brian Paul0b27ace2003-03-08 17:38:57 +0000[diff] [blame]15</p>
16
17<p>
Brian4d864b02007-04-04 09:33:12 -0600[diff] [blame]18A variety of device drivers allows Mesa to be used in many different
19environments ranging from software emulation to complete hardware acceleration
20for modern GPUs.
Brian Paul0b27ace2003-03-08 17:38:57 +0000[diff] [blame]21</p>
22
23<p>
Brian4d864b02007-04-04 09:33:12 -0600[diff] [blame]24Mesa ties into several other open-source projects: the
Timo Jyrinki385d6b22008-08-26 12:36:39 -0600[diff] [blame]25<a href="http://dri.freedesktop.org/" target="_parent">Direct Rendering
26Infrastructure</a> and <a href="http://x.org" target="_parent">X.org</a> to
27provide OpenGL support to users of X on Linux, FreeBSD and other operating
28systems.
Brian Paul0b27ace2003-03-08 17:38:57 +0000[diff] [blame]29</p>
30
31
Brian4d864b02007-04-04 09:33:12 -0600[diff] [blame]32
Brian Paul0b27ace2003-03-08 17:38:57 +0000[diff] [blame]33<H1>Project History</H1>
34
35<p>
Brian4d864b02007-04-04 09:33:12 -0600[diff] [blame]36The Mesa project was originally started by Brian Paul.
37Here's a short history of the project.
Brian Paul0b27ace2003-03-08 17:38:57 +0000[diff] [blame]38</p>
39
40<p>
41August, 1993: I begin working on Mesa in my spare time. The project
42has no name at that point. I was simply interested in writing a simple
433D graphics library that used the then-new OpenGL API. I was partially
44inspired by the <em>VOGL</em> library which emulated a subset of IRIS GL.
45I had been programming with IRIS GL since 1991.
46</p>
47
48<p>
49November 1994: I contact SGI to ask permission to distribute my OpenGL-like
50graphics library on the internet. SGI was generally receptive to the
51idea and after negotiations with SGI's legal department, I get permission
52to release it.
53</p>
54
55<p>
56February 1995: Mesa 1.0 is released on the internet. I expected that
57a few people would be interested in it, but not thousands.
58I was soon receiving patches, new features and thank-you notes on a
59daily basis. That encouraged me to continue working on Mesa. The
60name Mesa just popped into my head one day. SGI had asked me not to use
61the terms <em>"Open"</em> or <em>"GL"</em> in the project name and I didn't
62want to make up a new acronym. Later, I heard of the Mesa programming
63language and the Mesa spreadsheet for NeXTStep.
64</p>
65
66<p>
67In the early days, OpenGL wasn't available on too many systems.
68It even took a while for SGI to support it across their product line.
69Mesa filled a big hole during that time.
70For a lot of people, Mesa was their first introduction to OpenGL.
71I think SGI recognized that Mesa actually helped to promote
72the OpenGL API, so they didn't feel threatened by the project.
73</p>
74
75
76<p>
771995-1996: I continue working on Mesa both during my spare time and during
78my work hours at the Space Science and Engineering Center at the University
79of Wisconsin in Madison. My supervisor, Bill Hibbard, lets me do this because
80Mesa is now being using for the <a href="http://www.ssec.wisc.edu/%7Ebillh/vis.html" target="_parent">Vis5D</a> project.
81</p><p>
Brian Paul30aea492005-07-01 01:04:31 +0000[diff] [blame]82October 1996: Mesa 2.0 is released. It implements the OpenGL 1.1 specification.
Brian Paul0b27ace2003-03-08 17:38:57 +0000[diff] [blame]83</p>
84
85<p>
86March 1997: Mesa 2.2 is released. It supports the new 3dfx Voodoo graphics
87card via the Glide library. It's the first really popular hardware OpenGL
88implementation for Linux.
89</p>
90
91<p>
92September 1998: Mesa 3.0 is released. It's the first publicly-available
93implementation of the OpenGL 1.2 API.
94</p>
95
96<p>
97March 1999: I attend my first OpenGL ARB meeting. I contribute to the
98development of several official OpenGL extensions over the years.
99</p>
100
101<p>
102September 1999: I'm hired by Precision Insight, Inc. Mesa is a key
103component of 3D hardware acceleration in the new DRI project for XFree86.
104Drivers for 3dfx, 3dLabs, Intel, Matrox and ATI hardware soon follow.
105</p>
106
107<p>
108October 2001: Mesa 4.0 is released.
109It implements the OpenGL 1.3 specification.
110</p>
111
112
113<p>
114November 2001: I cofound <a href="http://www.tungstengraphics.com" target="_parent">
115Tungsten Graphics, Inc.</a> with Keith Whitwell, Jens Owen, David Dawes and
116Frank LaMonica.
117I continue to develop Mesa as part of my resposibilities with Tungsten
118Graphics and as a spare-time project.
119</p>
120
121<p>
122November 2002: Mesa 5.0 is released.
123It implements the OpenGL 1.4 specification.
124</p>
125
126<p>
Brian Pauld7af11a2004-01-07 14:51:30 +0000[diff] [blame]127January 2003: Mesa 6.0 is released. It implements the OpenGL 1.5
128specification as well as the GL_ARB_vertex_program and
129GL_ARB_fragment_program extensions.
130</p>
131
Brianaf846712007-04-27 17:00:13 -0600[diff] [blame]132<p>
Brian02dd2222007-06-28 16:44:24 -0600[diff] [blame]133June 2007: Mesa 7.0 is released, implementing the OpenGL 2.1 specification
Brianaf846712007-04-27 17:00:13 -0600[diff] [blame]134and OpenGL Shading Language.
135</p>
136
Brian Pauld7af11a2004-01-07 14:51:30 +0000[diff] [blame]137
138<p>
Brian Paul30aea492005-07-01 01:04:31 +0000[diff] [blame]139Ongoing: Mesa is used as the core of many hardware OpenGL drivers for
Brianaf846712007-04-27 17:00:13 -0600[diff] [blame]140the XFree86 and X.org X servers within the
Adam Jacksond78834b2005-11-03 20:49:07 +0000[diff] [blame]141<A href="http://dri.freedesktop.org/" target="_parent">DRI project</A>.
Brian Paul0b27ace2003-03-08 17:38:57 +0000[diff] [blame]142I continue to enhance Mesa with new extensions and features.
143</p>
144
145
146
147<H1>Major Versions</H1>
148
149<p>
Brianaf846712007-04-27 17:00:13 -0600[diff] [blame]150This is a summary of the major versions of Mesa.
151Mesa's major version number has been incremented whenever a new version
152of the OpenGL specification is implemented.
153</p>
154
155
156<H2>Version 7.x features</H2>
157<p>
158Version 7.x of Mesa implements the OpenGL 2.1 API. The main feature
159of OpenGL 2.x is the OpenGL Shading Language.
Brian Paul0b27ace2003-03-08 17:38:57 +0000[diff] [blame]160</p>
161
162
Brian Pauld7af11a2004-01-07 14:51:30 +0000[diff] [blame]163<H2>Version 6.x features</H2>
164<p>
165Version 6.x of Mesa implements the OpenGL 1.5 API with the following
166extensions incorporated as standard features:
167</p>
168<ul>
169<li>GL_ARB_occlusion_query
170<li>GL_ARB_vertex_buffer_object
Brian Pauld7af11a2004-01-07 14:51:30 +0000[diff] [blame]171<li>GL_EXT_shadow_funcs
172</ul>
173<p>
174Also note that several OpenGL tokens were renamed in OpenGL 1.5
Brian Paulb7c727e2005-08-19 16:57:50 +0000[diff] [blame]175for the sake of consistency.
176The old tokens are still available.
Brian Pauld7af11a2004-01-07 14:51:30 +0000[diff] [blame]177</p>
178<pre>
Brian Paulb7c727e2005-08-19 16:57:50 +0000[diff] [blame]179New Token Old Token
Brian Pauld7af11a2004-01-07 14:51:30 +0000[diff] [blame]180------------------------------------------------------------
181GL_FOG_COORD_SRC GL_FOG_COORDINATE_SOURCE
182GL_FOG_COORD GL_FOG_COORDINATE
183GL_CURRENT_FOG_COORD GL_CURRENT_FOG_COORDINATE
184GL_FOG_COORD_ARRAY_TYPE GL_FOG_COORDINATE_ARRAY_TYPE
185GL_FOG_COORD_ARRAY_STRIDE GL_FOG_COORDINATE_ARRAY_STRIDE
186GL_FOG_COORD_ARRAY_POINTER GL_FOG_COORDINATE_ARRAY_POINTER
187GL_FOG_COORD_ARRAY GL_FOG_COORDINATE_ARRAY
188GL_SRC0_RGB GL_SOURCE0_RGB
189GL_SRC1_RGB GL_SOURCE1_RGB
190GL_SRC2_RGB GL_SOURCE2_RGB
191GL_SRC0_ALPHA GL_SOURCE0_ALPHA
192GL_SRC1_ALPHA GL_SOURCE1_ALPHA
193GL_SRC2_ALPHA GL_SOURCE2_ALPHA
194</pre>
195<p>
196See the
197<a href="http://www.opengl.org/documentation/spec.html" target="_parent">
198OpenGL specification</a> for more details.
199</p>
200
201
202
Brian Paul0b27ace2003-03-08 17:38:57 +0000[diff] [blame]203<H2>Version 5.x features</H2>
204<p>
205Version 5.x of Mesa implements the OpenGL 1.4 API with the following
206extensions incorporated as standard features:
207</p>
208<ul>
209<li>GL_ARB_depth_texture
210<li>GL_ARB_shadow
211<li>GL_ARB_texture_env_crossbar
212<li>GL_ARB_texture_mirror_repeat
213<li>GL_ARB_window_pos
214<li>GL_EXT_blend_color
215<li>GL_EXT_blend_func_separate
216<li>GL_EXT_blend_logic_op
217<li>GL_EXT_blend_minmax
218<li>GL_EXT_blend_subtract
219<li>GL_EXT_fog_coord
220<li>GL_EXT_multi_draw_arrays
221<li>GL_EXT_point_parameters
222<li>GL_EXT_secondary_color
223<li>GL_EXT_stencil_wrap
Brian Paul3a604da2003-08-28 03:10:00 +0000[diff] [blame]224<li>GL_EXT_texture_lod_bias (plus, a per-texture LOD bias parameter)
Brian Paul0b27ace2003-03-08 17:38:57 +0000[diff] [blame]225<li>GL_SGIS_generate_mipmap
226</ul>
227
228
229<H2>Version 4.x features</H2>
230
231<p>
232Version 4.x of Mesa implements the OpenGL 1.3 API with the following
233extensions incorporated as standard features:
234</p>
235
236<ul>
237<li>GL_ARB_multisample
238<li>GL_ARB_multitexture
239<li>GL_ARB_texture_border_clamp
240<li>GL_ARB_texture_compression
241<li>GL_ARB_texture_cube_map
242<li>GL_ARB_texture_env_add
243<li>GL_ARB_texture_env_combine
244<li>GL_ARB_texture_env_dot3
245<li>GL_ARB_transpose_matrix
246</ul>
247
248<H2>Version 3.x features</H2>
249
250<p>
251Version 3.x of Mesa implements the OpenGL 1.2 API with the following
252features:
253</p>
254<ul>
255<li>BGR, BGRA and packed pixel formats
256<li>New texture border clamp mode
257<li>glDrawRangeElements()
258<li>standard 3-D texturing
259<li>advanced MIPMAP control
260<li>separate specular color interpolation
261</ul>
262
263
264<H2>Version 2.x features</H2>
265<p>
266Version 2.x of Mesa implements the OpenGL 1.1 API with the following
267features.
268</p>
269<ul>
270<li>Texture mapping:
271 <ul>
272 <li>glAreTexturesResident
273 <li>glBindTexture
274 <li>glCopyTexImage1D
275 <li>glCopyTexImage2D
276 <li>glCopyTexSubImage1D
277 <li>glCopyTexSubImage2D
278 <li>glDeleteTextures
279 <li>glGenTextures
280 <li>glIsTexture
281 <li>glPrioritizeTextures
282 <li>glTexSubImage1D
283 <li>glTexSubImage2D
284 </ul>
285<li>Vertex Arrays:
286 <ul>
287 <li>glArrayElement
288 <li>glColorPointer
289 <li>glDrawElements
290 <li>glEdgeFlagPointer
291 <li>glIndexPointer
292 <li>glInterleavedArrays
293 <li>glNormalPointer
294 <li>glTexCoordPointer
295 <li>glVertexPointer
296 </ul>
297<li>Client state management:
298 <ul>
299 <li>glDisableClientState
300 <li>glEnableClientState
301 <li>glPopClientAttrib
302 <li>glPushClientAttrib
303 </ul>
304<li>Misc:
305 <ul>
306 <li>glGetPointer
307 <li>glIndexub
308 <li>glIndexubv
309 <li>glPolygonOffset
310 </ul>
311</ul>
312
313
314</body>
315</html>