docs/README.BEOS

   1
   2                          Mesa / BeOS Information
   3
   4
   5
   6 * Introduction
   7
   8 Brian Paul added in Mesa 3.1 a driver for BeOS R4.5 operating system.
   9 This driver implements a clone of the BGLView class.  This class,
  10 derived from BView, allows OpenGL rendering into any BeOS window.  His
  11 driver was updated in Mesa 4.1 and again in version 6.1 by Philippe
  12 Houdoin, who's maintaining this driver since.
  13
  14 Any application which uses the BGLView should be able to use Mesa
  15 instead of Be's OpenGL without changing any code.
  16
  17 Since Be's OpenGL implementation (as of R5) is basically just the
  18 SGI sample implementation, it's pretty slow.  You'll see that Mesa
  19 is considerably faster.
  20
  21
  22 * Source Code
  23
  24 The source code for the driver is in src/mesa/drivers/beos/ directory.
  25 It's not 100% finished at this time but many GLUT-based demos are
  26 working.  No optimizations have been made at this time.
  27
  28
  29 * Compiling
  30
  31 Requirements:
  32   - gcc version 2.95.3 for BeOS
  33   You can find it here: http://www.bebits.com/app/2157
  34
  35 To build Mesa-powered BeOS libGL.so version, type this at root folder:
  36
  37 $ make beos
  38
  39 When it finishes the Mesa based libGL.so library for
  40 BeOS will be in the lib/ directory.
  41
  42 To install it as Be's default libGL.so replacement, put it in your
  43 /boot/home/config/lib/ directory. All your GL/GLUT apps will use
  44 the Mesa based then.
  45
  46 By default, it build a non-debug version library.
  47 The x86 (MMX, SSE and 3DNOW) optimizations are also supported for x86 target.
  48 For PowerPC BeOS flavor, sorry, Mesa don't have ppc (Altivec) optimizations
  49 yet.
  50
  51 To build a DEBUG version, type instead this :
  52
  53 $ DEBUG=1 make beos
  54
  55
  56 * Example Programs
  57
  58 Look in the progs/beos/ directory for one or two BGLView demo
  59 programs.  They should have been compiled along with the Mesa
  60 library.
  61
  62
  63 * GLUT
  64
  65 A beta version of GLUT 3.7 port for BeOS can be found at
  66 http://anobject.com/jehamby/Code/Glut-3.7-x86.zip.
  67
  68 There's is a 3.5 version in src/glut/beos/, too.
  69 The original distribution can be obtained from
  70 http://home.beoscentral.com/jehamby/Glut-3.5-x86.zip
  71
  72 They are special version of GLUT adapted for the BeOS.  I don't
  73 believe Mark Kilgard's normal GLUT distribution includes BeOS
  74 support.
  75
  76
  77 * Special Features
  78
  79 Mesa's implementation of the BGLView class has an extra member
  80 function:  CopySubBufferMESA().  It basically works like SwapBuffers()
  81 but it only copies a sub region from the back buffer to the front
  82 buffer.  This is a useful optimization for some applications.
  83 If you use this method in your code be sure that you check at runtime
  84 that you're actually using Mesa (with glGetString) so you don't
  85 cause a fatal error when running with Be's OpenGL.
  86
  87
  88 * Work Left To Do
  89
  90 - Switch to SGI GLU implementation..
  91 - Add to build the BeOS GLUT port. Update it to latest known (3.7 ?)
  92 - BDirectWindow single buffering support is not implemented yet.
  93 - Color index mode is not implemented yet.
  94 - Reading pixels from the front buffer not implemented yet.
  95 - There is also a BGLScreen class in BeOS for full-screen OpenGL rendering.
  96   This should also be implemented for Mesa.
  97 - Multiple renderers add-ons support, first step toward hardware acceleration
  98   support.
  99
 100 * Other contributors to this BeOS port
 101
 102 Marcin Konicki                   ahwayakchih <at> neoni <dot> net
 103 Francois Revol                  revol <at> free <dot> fr
 104
 105
 106 * Older BeOS Driver
 107
 108 Mesa 2.6 had an earlier BeOS driver.  It was based on Mesa's Off-screen
 109 rendering interface, not BGLView.  If you're interested in the older
 110 driver you should get Mesa 2.6.
 111
 112
 113 * BeOS and Glide
 114
 115 Mesa 3.0 supported the 3Dfx/Glide library on Beos.  Download Mesa 3.0
 116 if interested.  Ideally, the 3Dfx/Glide support should be updated to
 117 work with the new Mesa 3.1 BGLView implementation.
 118
 119 The Glide library hasn't been updated for BeOS R4 and newer, to my knowledge,
 120 as of February, 1999.
 121
 122
 123 ----------------------------------------------------------------------
 124 $Id: README.BEOS,v 1.10 2004/08/14 15:23:51 brianp Exp $