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+<body>
-<TITLE>Mesa Introduction</TITLE>
+<div class="header">
+ <h1>The Mesa 3D Graphics Library</h1>
+</div>
-<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="mesa.css"></head>
+<iframe src="contents.html"></iframe>
+<div class="content">
-<BODY>
-
-<H1>Introduction</H1>
+<h1>Introduction</h1>
<p>
-Mesa is a 3-D graphics library with an API which is very similar to
-that of <a href="http://www.opengl.org/" target="_parent">OpenGL</a>.*
-To the extent that Mesa utilizes the OpenGL command syntax or state
-machine, it is being used with authorization from <a
-href="http://www.sgi.com/" target="_parent">Silicon Graphics,
-Inc.</a>(SGI). However, the author does not possess an OpenGL license
-from SGI, and makes no claim that Mesa is in any way a compatible
-replacement for OpenGL or associated with SGI. Those who want a
-licensed implementation of OpenGL should contact a licensed
-vendor.
+Mesa is an open-source implementation of the
+<a href="http://www.opengl.org/">OpenGL</a> specification -
+a system for rendering interactive 3D graphics.
</p>
<p>
-Please do not refer to the library as <em>MesaGL</em> (for legal
-reasons). It's just <em>Mesa</em> or <em>The Mesa 3-D graphics
-library</em>. <br>
+A variety of device drivers allows Mesa to be used in many different
+environments ranging from software emulation to complete hardware acceleration
+for modern GPUs.
</p>
<p>
-* OpenGL is a trademark of <a href="http://www.sgi.com/"
-target="_parent">Silicon Graphics Incorporated</a>.
+Mesa ties into several other open-source projects: the
+<a href="http://dri.freedesktop.org/">Direct Rendering
+Infrastructure</a> and <a href="http://x.org">X.org</a> to
+provide OpenGL support to users of X on Linux, FreeBSD and other operating
+systems.
</p>
-<H1>Project History</H1>
+
+<h1>Project History</h1>
<p>
-The Mesa project was founded by me, Brian Paul. Here's a short history
-of the project.
+The Mesa project was originally started by Brian Paul.
+Here's a short history of the project.
</p>
<p>
1995-1996: I continue working on Mesa both during my spare time and during
my work hours at the Space Science and Engineering Center at the University
of Wisconsin in Madison. My supervisor, Bill Hibbard, lets me do this because
-Mesa is now being using for the <a href="http://www.ssec.wisc.edu/%7Ebillh/vis.html" target="_parent">Vis5D</a> project.
+Mesa is now being using for the <a href="http://www.ssec.wisc.edu/%7Ebillh/vis.html">Vis5D</a> project.
</p><p>
October 1996: Mesa 2.0 is released. It implements the OpenGL 1.1 specification.
</p>
<p>
-November 2001: I cofound <a href="http://www.tungstengraphics.com" target="_parent">
-Tungsten Graphics, Inc.</a> with Keith Whitwell, Jens Owen, David Dawes and
-Frank LaMonica.
-I continue to develop Mesa as part of my resposibilities with Tungsten
-Graphics and as a spare-time project.
+November 2001: I cofounded Tungsten Graphics, Inc. with Keith Whitwell,
+Jens Owen, David Dawes and Frank LaMonica.
+Tungsten Graphics was acquired by VMware in December 2008.
</p>
<p>
GL_ARB_fragment_program extensions.
</p>
+<p>
+June 2007: Mesa 7.0 is released, implementing the OpenGL 2.1 specification
+and OpenGL Shading Language.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+2008: Keith Whitwell and other Tungsten Graphics employees develop
+<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gallium3D">Gallium</a>
+- a new GPU abstraction layer. The latest Mesa drivers are based on
+Gallium and other APIs such as OpenVG are implemented on top of Gallium.
+</p>
+
+<p>
+February 2012: Mesa 8.0 is released, implementing the OpenGL 3.0 specification
+and version 1.30 of the OpenGL Shading Language.
+</p>
<p>
-Ongoing: Mesa is used as the core of many hardware OpenGL drivers for
-the XFree86 X.org X servers within the
-<A href="http://dri.freedesktop.org/" target="_parent">DRI project</A>.
-I continue to enhance Mesa with new extensions and features.
+Ongoing: Mesa is the OpenGL implementation for several types of hardware
+made by Intel, AMD and NVIDIA, plus the VMware virtual GPU.
+There's also several software-based renderers: swrast (the legacy
+Mesa rasterizer), softpipe (a gallium reference driver) and llvmpipe
+(LLVM/JIT-based high-speed rasterizer).
+Work continues on the drivers and core Mesa to implement newer versions
+of the OpenGL specification.
</p>
-<H1>Major Versions</H1>
+<h1>Major Versions</h1>
<p>
-This is a summary of the major versions of Mesa. Note that Mesa's major
-version number tracks OpenGL's minor version number (+1).
-Work is underway to implement the OpenGL 2.0 specification.
+This is a summary of the major versions of Mesa.
+Mesa's major version number has been incremented whenever a new version
+of the OpenGL specification is implemented.
</p>
-<H2>Version 6.x features</H2>
+<h2>Version 9.x features</h2>
+<p>
+Version 9.x of Mesa implements the OpenGL 3.1 API.
+While the driver for Intel Sandy Bridge and Ivy Bridge is the only
+driver to support OpenGL 3.1, many developers across the open-source
+community contributed features required for OpenGL 3.1. The primary
+features added since the Mesa 8.0 release are
+GL_ARB_texture_buffer_object and GL_ARB_uniform_buffer_object.
+</p>
+
+
+<h2>Version 8.x features</h2>
+<p>
+Version 8.x of Mesa implements the OpenGL 3.0 API.
+The developers at Intel deserve a lot of credit for implementing most
+of the OpenGL 3.0 features in core Mesa, the GLSL compiler as well as
+the i965 driver.
+</p>
+
+
+<h2>Version 7.x features</h2>
+<p>
+Version 7.x of Mesa implements the OpenGL 2.1 API. The main feature
+of OpenGL 2.x is the OpenGL Shading Language.
+</p>
+
+
+<h2>Version 6.x features</h2>
<p>
Version 6.x of Mesa implements the OpenGL 1.5 API with the following
extensions incorporated as standard features:
</pre>
<p>
See the
-<a href="http://www.opengl.org/documentation/spec.html" target="_parent">
+<a href="http://www.opengl.org/documentation/spec.html">
OpenGL specification</a> for more details.
</p>
-<H2>Version 5.x features</H2>
+<h2>Version 5.x features</h2>
<p>
Version 5.x of Mesa implements the OpenGL 1.4 API with the following
extensions incorporated as standard features:
</ul>
-<H2>Version 4.x features</H2>
+<h2>Version 4.x features</h2>
<p>
Version 4.x of Mesa implements the OpenGL 1.3 API with the following
<li>GL_ARB_transpose_matrix
</ul>
-<H2>Version 3.x features</H2>
+<h2>Version 3.x features</h2>
<p>
Version 3.x of Mesa implements the OpenGL 1.2 API with the following
</ul>
-<H2>Version 2.x features</H2>
+<h2>Version 2.x features</h2>
<p>
Version 2.x of Mesa implements the OpenGL 1.1 API with the following
features.
</ul>
</ul>
-
+</div>
</body>
</html>
projects / mesa.git / blobdiff