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| Mesa / BeOS Information |
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| * Introduction |
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| Mesa 4.1 features a driver for the BeOS. The driver implements |
| a clone of the BGLView class. This class, derived from BView, allows |
| OpenGL rendering into a BeOS window. |
| The 4.1 BeOS driver is an update of Brian Paul's BeOS driver released in Mesa 3.1. |
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| Any application which uses the BGLView should be able to use Mesa |
| instead of Be's OpenGL without changing any code. |
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| Since Be's OpenGL implementation (as of R5) is basically just the |
| SGI sample implementation, it's pretty slow. You'll see that Mesa |
| is considerably faster. |
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| * Source Code |
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| The source code for the driver is in Mesa-4.1/src/BeOS/ directory. |
| It's not 100% finished at this time but many GLUT-based demos are |
| working. No optimizations have been made at this time. |
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| * Compiling |
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| Requirements: |
| - gcc version 2.95.3 for BeOS |
| You can find it here: http://www.bebits.com/app/2157 |
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| Move to the Mesa-4.x src sub-directory and then type "make -f Makefile.BeOS-R5". |
| When it finishes the Mesa based libGL.so library for |
| BeOS will be in the Mesa-4.x/src/obj.{x86|ppc}/ directory. |
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| To install it as Be's default libGL.so replacement, put it in your |
| /boot/home/config/lib/ directory. All your GL/GLUTapps will use |
| the Mesa based then. |
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| By default, it build a non-debug version library. |
| The x86 (MMX, SSE and 3DNOW) optimizations are also supported for x86 target. |
| Sorry, Mesa don't have ppc (Altivec) optimizations yet. |
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| * Example Programs |
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| Look in the Mesa-4.x/BeOS/ directory for one or two BGLView demo |
| programs. They should have been compiled along with the Mesa |
| library. |
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| * GLUT |
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| A beta version of GLUT 3.7 port for BeOS can be found at |
| http://anobject.com/jehamby/Code/Glut-3.7-x86.zip. |
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| There's is a 2.5 version in src-glut.beos/, too. |
| The original distribution can be obtained from |
| http://home.beoscentral.com/jehamby/Glut-3.5-x86.zip |
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| They are special version of GLUT adapted for the BeOS. I don't |
| believe Mark Kilgard's normal GLUT distribution includes BeOS |
| support. |
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| * Special Features |
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| Mesa's implementation of the BGLView class has an extra member |
| function: CopySubBufferMESA(). It basically works like SwapBuffers() |
| but it only copies a sub region from the back buffer to the front |
| buffer. This is a useful optimization for some applications. |
| If you use this method in your code be sure that you check at runtime |
| that you're actually using Mesa (with glGetString) so you don't |
| cause a fatal error when running with Be's OpenGL. |
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| * Work Left To Do |
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| BDirectWindow single buffering support is not implemented yet. |
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| Color index mode is not implemented yet. |
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| Reading pixels from the front buffer not implemented yet. |
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| There is also a BGLScreen class in BeOS for full-screen OpenGL |
| rendering. This should also be implemented for Mesa. |
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| * Old BeOS Driver |
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| Mesa 2.6 had an earlier BeOS driver. It was based on Mesa's Off-screen |
| rendering interface, not BGLView. If you're interested in the older |
| driver you should get Mesa 2.6. |
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| * BeOS and Glide |
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| Mesa 3.0 supported the 3Dfx/Glide library on Beos. Download Mesa 3.0 |
| if interested. Ideally, the 3Dfx/Glide support should be updated to |
| work with the new Mesa 3.1 BGLView implementation. |
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| The Glide library hasn't been updated for BeOS R4, to my knowledge, as |
| of February, 1999. |
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| ---------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| $Id: README.BEOS,v 1.7 2002/09/19 16:19:44 brianp Exp $ |