356 lines
9.7 KiB
HTML
356 lines
9.7 KiB
HTML
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd">
|
|
<html lang="en">
|
|
<head>
|
|
<meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8">
|
|
<title>Mesa Introduction</title>
|
|
<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="mesa.css">
|
|
</head>
|
|
<body>
|
|
|
|
<div class="header">
|
|
<h1>The Mesa 3D Graphics Library</h1>
|
|
</div>
|
|
|
|
<iframe src="contents.html"></iframe>
|
|
<div class="content">
|
|
|
|
<h1>Introduction</h1>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
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>
|
|
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>
|
|
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>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
The Mesa project was originally started by Brian Paul.
|
|
Here's a short history of the project.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
August, 1993: I begin working on Mesa in my spare time. The project
|
|
has no name at that point. I was simply interested in writing a simple
|
|
3D graphics library that used the then-new OpenGL API. I was partially
|
|
inspired by the <em>VOGL</em> library which emulated a subset of IRIS GL.
|
|
I had been programming with IRIS GL since 1991.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
November 1994: I contact SGI to ask permission to distribute my OpenGL-like
|
|
graphics library on the internet. SGI was generally receptive to the
|
|
idea and after negotiations with SGI's legal department, I get permission
|
|
to release it.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
February 1995: Mesa 1.0 is released on the internet. I expected that
|
|
a few people would be interested in it, but not thousands.
|
|
I was soon receiving patches, new features and thank-you notes on a
|
|
daily basis. That encouraged me to continue working on Mesa. The
|
|
name Mesa just popped into my head one day. SGI had asked me not to use
|
|
the terms <em>"Open"</em> or <em>"GL"</em> in the project name and I didn't
|
|
want to make up a new acronym. Later, I heard of the Mesa programming
|
|
language and the Mesa spreadsheet for NeXTStep.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
In the early days, OpenGL wasn't available on too many systems.
|
|
It even took a while for SGI to support it across their product line.
|
|
Mesa filled a big hole during that time.
|
|
For a lot of people, Mesa was their first introduction to OpenGL.
|
|
I think SGI recognized that Mesa actually helped to promote
|
|
the OpenGL API, so they didn't feel threatened by 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">Vis5D</a> project.
|
|
</p><p>
|
|
October 1996: Mesa 2.0 is released. It implements the OpenGL 1.1 specification.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
March 1997: Mesa 2.2 is released. It supports the new 3dfx Voodoo graphics
|
|
card via the Glide library. It's the first really popular hardware OpenGL
|
|
implementation for Linux.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
September 1998: Mesa 3.0 is released. It's the first publicly-available
|
|
implementation of the OpenGL 1.2 API.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
March 1999: I attend my first OpenGL ARB meeting. I contribute to the
|
|
development of several official OpenGL extensions over the years.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
September 1999: I'm hired by Precision Insight, Inc. Mesa is a key
|
|
component of 3D hardware acceleration in the new DRI project for XFree86.
|
|
Drivers for 3dfx, 3dLabs, Intel, Matrox and ATI hardware soon follow.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
October 2001: Mesa 4.0 is released.
|
|
It implements the OpenGL 1.3 specification.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
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>
|
|
November 2002: Mesa 5.0 is released.
|
|
It implements the OpenGL 1.4 specification.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
January 2003: Mesa 6.0 is released. It implements the OpenGL 1.5
|
|
specification as well as the GL_ARB_vertex_program and
|
|
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 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>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
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 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:
|
|
</p>
|
|
<ul>
|
|
<li>GL_ARB_occlusion_query
|
|
<li>GL_ARB_vertex_buffer_object
|
|
<li>GL_EXT_shadow_funcs
|
|
</ul>
|
|
<p>
|
|
Also note that several OpenGL tokens were renamed in OpenGL 1.5
|
|
for the sake of consistency.
|
|
The old tokens are still available.
|
|
</p>
|
|
<pre>
|
|
New Token Old Token
|
|
------------------------------------------------------------
|
|
GL_FOG_COORD_SRC GL_FOG_COORDINATE_SOURCE
|
|
GL_FOG_COORD GL_FOG_COORDINATE
|
|
GL_CURRENT_FOG_COORD GL_CURRENT_FOG_COORDINATE
|
|
GL_FOG_COORD_ARRAY_TYPE GL_FOG_COORDINATE_ARRAY_TYPE
|
|
GL_FOG_COORD_ARRAY_STRIDE GL_FOG_COORDINATE_ARRAY_STRIDE
|
|
GL_FOG_COORD_ARRAY_POINTER GL_FOG_COORDINATE_ARRAY_POINTER
|
|
GL_FOG_COORD_ARRAY GL_FOG_COORDINATE_ARRAY
|
|
GL_SRC0_RGB GL_SOURCE0_RGB
|
|
GL_SRC1_RGB GL_SOURCE1_RGB
|
|
GL_SRC2_RGB GL_SOURCE2_RGB
|
|
GL_SRC0_ALPHA GL_SOURCE0_ALPHA
|
|
GL_SRC1_ALPHA GL_SOURCE1_ALPHA
|
|
GL_SRC2_ALPHA GL_SOURCE2_ALPHA
|
|
</pre>
|
|
<p>
|
|
See the
|
|
<a href="http://www.opengl.org/documentation/spec.html">
|
|
OpenGL specification</a> for more details.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
<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:
|
|
</p>
|
|
<ul>
|
|
<li>GL_ARB_depth_texture
|
|
<li>GL_ARB_shadow
|
|
<li>GL_ARB_texture_env_crossbar
|
|
<li>GL_ARB_texture_mirror_repeat
|
|
<li>GL_ARB_window_pos
|
|
<li>GL_EXT_blend_color
|
|
<li>GL_EXT_blend_func_separate
|
|
<li>GL_EXT_blend_logic_op
|
|
<li>GL_EXT_blend_minmax
|
|
<li>GL_EXT_blend_subtract
|
|
<li>GL_EXT_fog_coord
|
|
<li>GL_EXT_multi_draw_arrays
|
|
<li>GL_EXT_point_parameters
|
|
<li>GL_EXT_secondary_color
|
|
<li>GL_EXT_stencil_wrap
|
|
<li>GL_EXT_texture_lod_bias (plus, a per-texture LOD bias parameter)
|
|
<li>GL_SGIS_generate_mipmap
|
|
</ul>
|
|
|
|
|
|
<h2>Version 4.x features</h2>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
Version 4.x of Mesa implements the OpenGL 1.3 API with the following
|
|
extensions incorporated as standard features:
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<ul>
|
|
<li>GL_ARB_multisample
|
|
<li>GL_ARB_multitexture
|
|
<li>GL_ARB_texture_border_clamp
|
|
<li>GL_ARB_texture_compression
|
|
<li>GL_ARB_texture_cube_map
|
|
<li>GL_ARB_texture_env_add
|
|
<li>GL_ARB_texture_env_combine
|
|
<li>GL_ARB_texture_env_dot3
|
|
<li>GL_ARB_transpose_matrix
|
|
</ul>
|
|
|
|
<h2>Version 3.x features</h2>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
Version 3.x of Mesa implements the OpenGL 1.2 API with the following
|
|
features:
|
|
</p>
|
|
<ul>
|
|
<li>BGR, BGRA and packed pixel formats
|
|
<li>New texture border clamp mode
|
|
<li>glDrawRangeElements()
|
|
<li>standard 3-D texturing
|
|
<li>advanced MIPMAP control
|
|
<li>separate specular color interpolation
|
|
</ul>
|
|
|
|
|
|
<h2>Version 2.x features</h2>
|
|
<p>
|
|
Version 2.x of Mesa implements the OpenGL 1.1 API with the following
|
|
features.
|
|
</p>
|
|
<ul>
|
|
<li>Texture mapping:
|
|
<ul>
|
|
<li>glAreTexturesResident
|
|
<li>glBindTexture
|
|
<li>glCopyTexImage1D
|
|
<li>glCopyTexImage2D
|
|
<li>glCopyTexSubImage1D
|
|
<li>glCopyTexSubImage2D
|
|
<li>glDeleteTextures
|
|
<li>glGenTextures
|
|
<li>glIsTexture
|
|
<li>glPrioritizeTextures
|
|
<li>glTexSubImage1D
|
|
<li>glTexSubImage2D
|
|
</ul>
|
|
<li>Vertex Arrays:
|
|
<ul>
|
|
<li>glArrayElement
|
|
<li>glColorPointer
|
|
<li>glDrawElements
|
|
<li>glEdgeFlagPointer
|
|
<li>glIndexPointer
|
|
<li>glInterleavedArrays
|
|
<li>glNormalPointer
|
|
<li>glTexCoordPointer
|
|
<li>glVertexPointer
|
|
</ul>
|
|
<li>Client state management:
|
|
<ul>
|
|
<li>glDisableClientState
|
|
<li>glEnableClientState
|
|
<li>glPopClientAttrib
|
|
<li>glPushClientAttrib
|
|
</ul>
|
|
<li>Misc:
|
|
<ul>
|
|
<li>glGetPointer
|
|
<li>glIndexub
|
|
<li>glIndexubv
|
|
<li>glPolygonOffset
|
|
</ul>
|
|
</ul>
|
|
|
|
</div>
|
|
</body>
|
|
</html>
|