Joachim Diepstraten wrote: > Well 3dlabs needs OpenGL2.0 for their cards otherwise no one will > jump on them.
Not really. 3DLabs have traditionally sold to the high-end market. They really haven't cared less about the gamers and probably still don't - although the new Creative Labs ownership may change that somewhat. For the game market, most programmers are using DX, not OpenGL. Since DX has software emulation modes for the shaders it really doesn't matter whether OpenGL 2.0 is available or not. From what we can gather, MS is very actively pursuing compatibility between DX and OpenGL in the high-level shader language used by both specs (ie, to the point of being completely transparent). I know that Phil Taylor is floating around on this list here maybe he can put a definite word in on this. >>Not likely. OGL 2.0 is a long way off yet. They still have to do Java >>bindings for it and all the subsetting/profiling features they want to > > > Haeh? Why is that a requirement? I don't get it, can you please put more > light on this? There are two major factors. One of their interest (3DLabs and other vendors) is the mobile devices. I have heard from multiple sources now that pretty much all the major mobile phone makers will have hardware 3D accelaration on phones by the start of 2004. At the other end of the spectrum, phone makers are unequivocally saying "the only way you will provide executable content on our phone is with Java". I first heard this well over 18 months ago and that statement is still continuing (we had someone from Symbian at the web3d fest last week). If someone wants to provide an application that runs 3D graphics on the phone, it will be written in Java - hence JSR 184 showing up. Now, the OpenGL folks want to nab that market. They were going all wishy-washy about it and just sort of paying lip service to the "we'll provide Java bindings". That became a non-option as of last week. They hadn't been paying too much attention to the whole market place and what everyone wants and needs. They are now much more enlightened. There is a window of oppourtunity of about 6 months to get this process going and moving at considerable velocity otherwise all the OpenGL folks are going to fall in a screaming heap (ie the chip manufacturers are betting on having OpenGL support so that they can sell chips to the phone makers). > That's something new I hear, but it's interesting who makes these > requirements? I know SUN/IBM are part of the OpenGL comunity but are they > so important? Yes and no. For the JSR process, yes they are. For the OpenGL process, they are barely consequential - SGI still basically holds the reigns there. You can't call something OpenGL without their blessing. Sun don't want to bless something they didn't develop through the JSR process. You see the political problem here? Anyway, we're still sorting through a few of the issues now. Rest assured that we're (yumetech and a couple of other companies) are wedged right in the middle of the chess game right now and it's not exactly the most fun place to be. The light is at the end of the tunnel and we have confirmed it is not an oncoming train, but rather real (radiosity rendered) sunlight. Formal OpenGL Java bindings are coming. It's not If but When. When will be some time before Siggraph at least with the formalised work starting. If I have anything to do with the outcome of that process, things will be happening rather quickly from that point onwards. -- Justin Couch http://www.vlc.com.au/~justin/ Java Architect & Bit Twiddler http://www.yumetech.com/ Author, Java 3D FAQ Maintainer http://www.j3d.org/ ------------------------------------------------------------------- "Humanism is dead. Animals think, feel; so do machines now. Neither man nor woman is the measure of all things. Every organism processes data according to its domain, its environment; you, with all your brains, would be useless in a mouse's universe..." - Greg Bear, Slant ------------------------------------------------------------------- =========================================================================== To unsubscribe, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] and include in the body of the message "signoff JAVA3D-INTEREST". For general help, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] and include in the body of the message "help".
