OpenGL Extensions Viewer - Will This Help Troubleshoot?

BlindedByTheLight · Post #1by **BlindedByTheLight** » 08.05.2005, 20:11

So I came across this little freeware product:

Product Description:

OpenGL Extensions Viewer displays the vendor name, the version implemented, the renderer name and the extensions of the current OpenGL 3D accelerator.

If you have an Internet connection, you can retrieve from SGI the extension's specifications that explain the available extensions.

OpenGL Extension Viewer (GLView) has been suggested by OpenGL.org and nVidia for OpenGL developers. Available for English, French, Czech, Ukranian, Dutch, German, Japanese.

It tells which versions of OpenGL are implemented, which extensions are supported, etc. and even runs test. My guess is this would be pretty useful to the developers - expecially if we compile a database of various graphics card 's compliances. It comes up with a LOT of info so if someone more knowledgeable than I knows what is relevant, I'd be happy to post what my little Radeon 8500 is pumping out.

Here's the link: http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/25549

Post #2by **t00fri** » 09.05.2005, 17:01

I am sure you are aware that Celestia displays most of the required OpenGL info within the program itself, under Help->OpenGL Info. It looks e.g. like this for my (miserable) ATI 9200SE card in the office:

Code: Select all

Vendor : Tungsten Graphics, Inc.
Renderer : Mesa DRI R200 20040929 AGP 4x x86/MMX/SSE2 TCL
Version : 1.3 Mesa 6.2.1
Max simultaneous textures: 4
Max texture size: 2048

Supported Extensions:
    GL_ARB_imaging
    GL_ARB_multisample
    GL_ARB_multitexture
    GL_ARB_texture_border_clamp
    GL_ARB_texture_compression
    GL_ARB_texture_cube_map
    GL_ARB_texture_env_add
    GL_ARB_texture_env_combine
    GL_ARB_texture_env_dot3
    GL_ARB_texture_mirrored_repeat
    GL_ARB_texture_rectangle
    GL_ARB_transpose_matrix
    GL_ARB_vertex_buffer_object
    GL_ARB_vertex_program
    GL_ARB_window_pos
    GL_EXT_abgr
    GL_EXT_bgra
    GL_EXT_blend_color
    GL_EXT_blend_equation_separate
    GL_EXT_blend_func_separate
    GL_EXT_blend_minmax
    GL_EXT_blend_subtract
    GL_EXT_clip_volume_hint
    GL_EXT_compiled_vertex_array
    GL_EXT_convolution
    GL_EXT_copy_texture
    GL_EXT_draw_range_elements
    GL_EXT_histogram
    GL_EXT_packed_pixels
    GL_EXT_polygon_offset
    GL_EXT_rescale_normal
    GL_EXT_secondary_color
    GL_EXT_separate_specular_color
    GL_EXT_stencil_wrap
    GL_EXT_subtexture
    GL_EXT_texture
    GL_EXT_texture3D
    GL_EXT_texture_edge_clamp
    GL_EXT_texture_env_add
    GL_EXT_texture_env_combine
    GL_EXT_texture_env_dot3
    GL_EXT_texture_filter_anisotropic
    GL_EXT_texture_lod_bias
    GL_EXT_texture_mirror_clamp
    GL_EXT_texture_object
    GL_EXT_texture_rectangle
    GL_EXT_vertex_array
    GL_APPLE_packed_pixels
    GL_ATI_blend_equation_separate
    GL_ATI_texture_env_combine3
    GL_ATI_texture_mirror_once
    GL_IBM_rasterpos_clip
    GL_IBM_texture_mirrored_repeat
    GL_INGR_blend_func_separate
    GL_MESA_pack_invert
    GL_MESA_ycbcr_texture
    GL_MESA_window_pos
    GL_NV_blend_square
    GL_NV_light_max_exponent
    GL_NV_texture_rectangle
    GL_NV_texgen_reflection
    GL_SGI_color_matrix
    GL_SGI_color_table
    GL_SGIS_generate_mipmap
    GL_SGIS_texture_border_clamp
    GL_SGIS_texture_edge_clamp
    GL_SGIS_texture_lod

Bye Fridger

BlindedByTheLight · Post #3by **BlindedByTheLight** » 09.05.2005, 18:48

I am sure you are aware that Celestia displays most of the required OpenGL info within the program itself, under Help->OpenGL Info.

Well, yeah, I am aware that for some users the required OpenGL info is available in Celestia under Help->OpenGL... but for me (running the Mac OS X) version, the only thing under Help is "Celestia Help" and that merely gives an error when selected... unless I'm doing something wrong - which is ALWAYS a distinct possibility...

Post #4by **t00fri** » 09.05.2005, 19:16

BlindedByTheLight wrote:
I am sure you are aware that Celestia displays most of the required OpenGL info within the program itself, under Help->OpenGL Info.

Well, yeah, I am aware that for some users the required OpenGL info is available in Celestia under Help->OpenGL... but for me (running the Mac OS X) version, the only thing under Help is "Celestia Help" and that merely gives an error when selected... unless I'm doing something wrong - which is ALWAYS a distinct possibility...

Let me perhaps "adjust" your wording a little ;-)

"some users" --> " all but OS X users"

The OpenGL info is available for Windows users (the vast majority) and all supported Linux varieties.

Bye Fridger

BlindedByTheLight · Post #5by **BlindedByTheLight** » 09.05.2005, 19:19

Ah... well, as I suspected. Good thing I'm used to being in the abandoned minority computer-wise... Of course, since that also includes abandoned by virus-writers, I won't complain too much.

julesstoop · Post #6by **julesstoop** » 09.05.2005, 19:27

I use the program you mention as well and it helped me find out yesterday - rather disappointedly - that Tiger still offers no complete support for Open GL 2.0

Post #7by **ElChristou** » 09.05.2005, 20:22

t00fri wrote:
BlindedByTheLight wrote:
I am sure you are aware that Celestia displays most of the required OpenGL info within the program itself, under Help->OpenGL Info.

Well, yeah, I am aware that for some users the required OpenGL info is available in Celestia under Help->OpenGL... but for me (running the Mac OS X) version, the only thing under Help is "Celestia Help" and that merely gives an error when selected... unless I'm doing something wrong - which is ALWAYS a distinct possibility...

Let me perhaps "adjust" your wording a little

"some users" --> " all but OS X users"

The OpenGL info is available for Windows users (the vast majority) and all supported Linux varieties.

Bye Fridger

Hello, Blinded

Well Fridger in reality want to say that us, poor osX users, don't have yet this feature implemented, but he hope that quickly this injustice will be repaired... :wink:

BlindedByTheLight · Post #8by **BlindedByTheLight** » 09.05.2005, 21:24

Supposedly - if the rumor sites can trusted 10.4.1 will bring 2.0 implementation... I guess we'll find out soon enough. The target release is mid-May to late May.

julesstoop · Post #9by **julesstoop** » 10.05.2005, 14:55

As far as I can recall, I started that rumor myself. :wink:

Post #10by **dirkpitt** » 12.05.2005, 11:27

BlindedByTheLight wrote:Supposedly - if the rumor sites can trusted 10.4.1 will bring 2.0 implementation... I guess we'll find out soon enough. The target release is mid-May to late May.

Well there are many ways to implement 2.0. Right now Apple is saying, "it's too hard to implement hardware-accelerated GLSL so we're going to offer a software renderer for now. Besides, it works great!" Ok, so Tiger 10.4.0 runs GLSL fine, except the software renderer lacks many other GL features (extensions) that make it usable at all. It's only suitable as a demo now, and I'd be very surprised if a production-quality product was available in less than a month, for 10.4.1.

Anyway, the OpenGL info produced by Celestia (Windows + Linux) is really overkill for OS X, because unlike on Windows and Linux, OS X video drivers only get major updates very rarely. So once someone says "I have a eMac running 10.3.x...." or "I have an iMac 20" I bought yesterday running Tiger 10.4...." then it tells you what the GL version is, what the graphic card is, in short, just about everything needed for troubleshooting. However, it'd probably be useful in some cases for Celestia to print at least the max supported texture size (what Celestia should really do is report an error when it can't load a huge texture...).