I'm coming from having worked mostly with Direct3D and only a small amount of OpenGL 1.x knowledge, and now that I'm trying to learn the ins and outs of modern OpenGL I'm having a very hard time understanding a few things, but none more than this business with deprecation. I'm trying to figure out what features I should or should not be using if I want to keep my code very core/forward compatible thing-a-ma-bob. I'm targeting 4.x specifically. Why is there no concise information available about what IS and IS NOT considered deprecated?
Even more confusing is when I run into things like this: I read online that GL_EXTENSIONS is deprecated in 3.0, so why on Earth can I still use it when I am using the latest glcorearb.h and a 4.2 core profile forward compatible context? I thought it was supposed to be removed for forward compatible contexts.
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Trying to comprehend OpenGL
Started by Chris_F, Sep 20 2012 02:02 PM
12 replies to this topic
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#2 Marketplace Seller - Reputation: 8909
Posted 20 September 2012 - 02:09 PM
I came across these official quick reference cards a few months ago, I saved them for when I later use OpenGL. Maybe they can help? They color-code the deprecated functions, it looks like.
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#3 Moderators - Reputation: 4633
Posted 20 September 2012 - 02:10 PM
There are plenty of tutorials focusing on the modern API. You can start looking at the Getting Started box in the OpenGL forum for a few of them. If you want a concise list of what's deprecated and what's not, check the quick reference card at the OpenGL Registry. At the registry you can find the API documentation as well which has all the information about deprecated functions but not as a very concise list of course.
#4 Members - Reputation: 593
Posted 22 September 2012 - 12:34 PM
Either non-conforming driver (i doubt it a bit, what GPU?) or you do not have a forward compatible context. Sure you set it up correctly (drop code)?Even more confusing is when I run into things like this: I read online that GL_EXTENSIONS is deprecated in 3.0, so why on Earth can I still use it when I am using the latest glcorearb.h and a 4.2 core profile forward compatible context? I thought it was supposed to be removed for forward compatible contexts.
Trivia: Glew uses that deprecated function which causes a crapton of errors - iirc, one has to allow use of experimental extensions to make glew use the proper functions to get around the problem.
#5 Members - Reputation: 742
Posted 23 September 2012 - 12:25 PM
Either non-conforming driver (i doubt it a bit, what GPU?) or you do not have a forward compatible context. Sure you set it up correctly (drop code)?
Trivia: Glew uses that deprecated function which causes a crapton of errors - iirc, one has to allow use of experimental extensions to make glew use the proper functions to get around the problem.
AMD HD 5850 and glGetString(GL_VERSION) is reporting a 4.2 core peofile forward-compatible context, and glGetString(GL_EXTENSIONS) still works without any errors.
#6 Members - Reputation: 593
Posted 23 September 2012 - 01:00 PM
AMD tends to be more strict about spec than NVIDIA (for circumstantial reasons), but seems they do not bother to disable that function ... understandable. One of course should not use the function regardless of whether it works with one-or-other driver. I recommend to get a debug context with all the debugging bells and whistles enabled (not available on my hardware, so not sure about their quality currently) or use gDebugger (which definitely does the job) to highlight that kind of problems.
#11 Crossbones+ - Reputation: 5143
Posted 24 September 2012 - 05:01 AM
Run your program through gDEBugger. It will show you when you are using any kind of deprecated functions or macros.
Remember, functions are not the only things that can be deprecated, and gDEBugger is probably the best way to make sure you are not using anything that is.
L. Spiro
Remember, functions are not the only things that can be deprecated, and gDEBugger is probably the best way to make sure you are not using anything that is.
L. Spiro
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#13 Members - Reputation: 190
Posted 27 September 2012 - 09:49 AM
L.Spiro has the right of it. A preemptive option is to check the SDK docs at opengl.org. The 3.3 and 4.2 manuals no longer include listings for functions that have been removed from the standard, so a good rule of thumb for core functionality is "if it's not in the SDK, it's probably no longer needed".
Extensions are a whole different can of worms.
Extensions are a whole different can of worms.
