gl3w is the easiest way to get your hands on the functionality offered by the OpenGL core profile specification.
Its main part is a simple gl3w_gen.py Python script that downloads the Khronos supported glcorearb.h header and generates gl3w.h and gl3w.c from it. Those files can then be added and linked (statically or dynamically) into your project.
gl3w_gen.py requires Python version 2.7 or newer. It is also compatible with Python 3.x.
Here is a simple example of using gl3w with glut. Note that GL/gl3w.h must be included before any other OpenGL related headers:
#include <stdio.h> #include <GL/gl3w.h> #include <GL/glut.h> // ... int main(int argc, char **argv) { glutInit(&argc, argv); glutInitDisplayMode(GLUT_RGBA | GLUT_DEPTH | GLUT_DOUBLE); glutInitWindowSize(width, height); glutCreateWindow("cookie"); glutReshapeFunc(reshape); glutDisplayFunc(display); glutKeyboardFunc(keyboard); glutSpecialFunc(special); glutMouseFunc(mouse); glutMotionFunc(motion); if (gl3wInit()) { fprintf(stderr, "failed to initialize OpenGL\n"); return -1; } if (!gl3wIsSupported(3, 2)) { fprintf(stderr, "OpenGL 3.2 not supported\n"); return -1; } printf("OpenGL %s, GLSL %s\n", glGetString(GL_VERSION), glGetString(GL_SHADING_LANGUAGE_VERSION)); // ... glutMainLoop(); return 0; }
The gl3w API consists of just three functions:
int gl3wInit(void)
Initializes the library. Should be called once after an OpenGL context has been created. Returns0
when gl3w was initialized successfully,non-zero
if there was an error.
int gl3wIsSupported(int major, int minor)
Returns1
when OpenGL core profile version major.minor is available and0
otherwise.
GL3WglProc gl3wGetProcAddress(const char *proc)
Returns the address of an OpenGL extension function. Generally, you won't need to use it since gl3w loads all functions defined in the OpenGL core profile on initialization. It allows you to load OpenGL extensions outside of the core profile.
The generator script optionally takes the arguments:
--ext
to include the GL Extensions in output header.
--root=outputdir
to set the location for the output to something else than current working directory.
gl3w is in the public domain. See the file UNLICENSE for more information.
- Slavomir Kaslev <slavomir.kaslev@gmail.com>
- Initial implementation
- Kelvin McDowell
- Mac OS X support
- Sjors Gielen
- Mac OS X support
- Travis Gesslein
- Patches regarding glcorearb.h
- Arthur Tombs
- Port to Python 3
- Daniel Cousens [https://github.com/dcousens]
- Code contributions