-- Forwarded message --
Date: Wed, 26 Jan 2000 10:39:14 -0600 (CST)
From: Stephen J Baker [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: [Mesa-dev] SGI Opensources OpenGL!
On Wed, 26 Jan 2000, C.J. Beyer wrote:
Well, from reading the licence FAQ...
Which is here BTW:
http://oss.sgi.com/projects/ogl-sample/faq.html
... it might answer Gareth Hughes question about that extension:
"Some ways we can work together might include implementations of new
ARB-specified OpenGL extensions..."
Yep. Although I think they are talking more in terms of sharing the
code for those extensions rather than the specification of the
extension which (I guess) is what Gareth is talking about.
However, I'd really like to here responces to this comment:
"Based on discussions with some of the active Mesa developers,
there's a reasonable chance of merging the two together
into a single reference implementation and driver kit over time."
Someone at SGI once told me that there had been discussions about dumping
SGI's reference implementation in favor of Mesa - but that was a LONG time
ago - before OpenGL 1.2 and the optional imaging subset stuff (which Mesa
doesnt implement - but the reference implementation must).
It would be kinda ironic if the one implementation of the OpenGL API that
isn't allowed to be called OpenGL would end up being the reference
implementation!
I have a couple of comments (now I've read the FAQ):
1) They mention that this release does not include the dynamic code
generation rasterizer that's in SGI's OpenGL for Windoze.
That's a shame because that could have benefitted software-only
rendering under Mesa.
2) It *does* include the optional imaging subset of OpenGL 1.2 - which
would be a nice addition to Mesa.
3) To quote the FAQ:
"Do I still need a license for OpenGL? Yes"...snip
So, if I read this right (and IANAL), if you take this code and do something
to it, you *still* can't call it OpenGL. That's actually pretty reasonable
because you'd still need to pass the conformance test suite and that's *still*
not OpenSourced.
Later on they say:
"...we allow you to use the following exact attribution (no more,
no less) in your software products that are based on this
Sample Implementation:
This software was created using the published OpenGL® version
1.2.1 Sample Implementation, but has not been independently
verified as being compliant with the OpenGL®1 version 1.2.1, GLU
version 1.3, or GLX version 1.3 Specifications."
...well, at least it's made crystal clear what you have to do to
stay legal.
The big favor I'd like to ask of SGI is whether they'd release the
compliance suite for public use (not necessarily as "Open" or as
"Source" - there might be good reasons not to do that).
Whilst that wouldn't change the use of the OpenGL *name*, it would allow
Joe Public to test SquonkGL ("...created using the published OpenGL..")
to see if it is still "an implementation of the OpenGL API".
Given the potential for this newly freed code to create multiple Mesa-like
"implementations of the OpenGL API" (we need a non-copyrighted name for
those things), it would be nice to have a reasonably official way
to test them for yourself against the gold standard.
I appreciate that there is already a partial freeware "test"
suite (GLEAN), it's still FAR from being a comprehensive test
harness.
Steve Baker(817)619-2657 (Vox/Vox-Mail)
Raytheon Systems Inc. (817)619-2466 (Fax)
Work: [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.hti.com
Home: [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://web2.airmail.net/sjbaker1
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