%------------------------------------------------------------------------- % GLFW Users Guide % API Version: 2.7 %------------------------------------------------------------------------- % Document class \documentclass[a4paper,11pt,oneside]{report} % Document title and API version \newcommand{\glfwdoctype}[1][0]{Users Guide} \newcommand{\glfwapiver}[1][0]{2.7} % Common document settings and macros \input{glfwdoc.sty} % PDF specific document settings \hypersetup{pdftitle={GLFW Users Guide}} \hypersetup{pdfauthor={Marcus Geelnard}} \hypersetup{pdfkeywords={GLFW,OpenGL,guide,manual}} %------------------------------------------------------------------------- % Document body %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \begin{document} \pagestyle{plain} % Title page \glfwmaketitle % Summary, trademarks and table of contents \pagenumbering{roman} \setcounter{page}{1} %------------------------------------------------------------------------- % Summary and Trademarks %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \chapter*{Summary} This document is a users guide for the \GLFW\ API that gives a practical introduction to using \GLFW . For a more detailed description of the \GLFW\ API you should refer to the \textit{GLFW Reference Manual}. \vspace{5cm} \large Trademarks \small OpenGL and IRIX are registered trademarks of Silicon Graphics, Inc.\linebreak Microsoft and Windows are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation.\linebreak Mac OS is a registered trademark of Apple Computer, Inc.\linebreak Linux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds.\linebreak FreeBSD is a registered trademark of Wind River Systems, Inc.\linebreak Solaris is a trademark of Sun Microsystems, Inc.\linebreak UNIX is a registered trademark of The Open Group.\linebreak X Window System is a trademark of The Open Group.\linebreak POSIX is a trademark of IEEE.\linebreak Truevision, TARGA and TGA are registered trademarks of Truevision, Inc.\linebreak IBM is a registered trademark of IBM Corporation.\linebreak All other trademarks mentioned in this document are the property of their respective owners. \normalsize %------------------------------------------------------------------------- % Table of contents %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \tableofcontents \pagebreak % Document chapters starts here... \pagenumbering{arabic} \setcounter{page}{1} \pagestyle{fancy} %------------------------------------------------------------------------- % Introduction %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \chapter{Introduction} \thispagestyle{fancy} \GLFW\ is a portable API (Application Program Interface) that handles operating system specific tasks related to \OpenGL\ programming. While \OpenGL\ in general is portable, easy to use and often results in tidy and compact code, the operating system specific mechanisms that are required to set up and manage an \OpenGL\ window are quite the opposite. \GLFW\ tries to remedy this by providing the following functionality: \begin{itemize} \item Opening and managing an \OpenGL\ window. \item Keyboard, mouse and joystick input. \item High precision time input. \item Support for querying and using \OpenGL\ extensions. \end{itemize} \vspace{18pt} All this functionality is implemented as a set of easy-to-use functions, which makes it possible to write an \OpenGL\ application framework in just a few lines of code. The \GLFW\ API is operating system and platform independent, making it very simple to port \GLFW\ based \OpenGL\ applications between the supported platforms. Currently supported platforms are: \begin{itemize} \item Microsoft Windows\textsuperscript{\textregistered} \item Unix\textsuperscript{\textregistered} or Unix­-like systems running the X Window System\texttrademark with GLX version 1.3 or later \item Mac OS X\textsuperscript{\textregistered} 10.5 and later, using Cocoa\footnote{Support for joysticks missing at the time of writing.} \end{itemize} There is also deprecated support for Mac OS X versions 10.3 and 10.4, using the Carbon API. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- % Getting Started %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \chapter{Getting Started} \thispagestyle{fancy} In this chapter you will learn how to write a simple \OpenGL\ application using \GLFW . We start by initializing \GLFW , then we open a window and read some user keyboard input. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \section{Initializing GLFW} Before using any of the \GLFW\ functions, it is necessary to call \textbf{glfwInit}. It initializes the parts of \GLFW\ that are not dependent on a window, such as time and joystick input. The C syntax is: \begin{lstlisting} int glfwInit(void) \end{lstlisting} \textbf{glfwInit} returns GL\_TRUE if initialization succeeded, or GL\_FALSE if it failed. When your application is done using \GLFW , typically at the very end of the program, you should call \textbf{glfwTerminate}. The C syntax is: \begin{lstlisting} void glfwTerminate(void) \end{lstlisting} This releases any resources allocated by GLFW and closes the window if it is open. After this call, you must call \textbf{glfwInit} again before using any \GLFW\ functions). %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \section{Opening An OpenGL Window} Opening an \OpenGL\ window is done with the \textbf{glfwOpenWindow} function. The function takes nine arguments, which are used to describe the following properties of the requested window: \begin{itemize} \item Window dimensions (width and height) in pixels. \item Color and alpha buffer bit depth. \item Depth buffer (Z-buffer) bit depth. \item Stencil buffer bit depth. \item Whether to use fullscreen or windowed mode. \end{itemize} The C language syntax for \textbf{glfwOpenWindow} is: \begin{lstlisting} int glfwOpenWindow(int width, int height, int redbits, int greenbits, int bluebits, int alphabits, int depthbits, int stencilbits, int mode) \end{lstlisting} \textbf{glfwOpenWindow} returns GL\_TRUE if the window was opened correctly, or GL\_FALSE if \GLFW\ failed to open the window. \GLFW\ tries to open a window that best matches the requested parameters. Some parameters may be omitted by setting them to zero, which will result in \GLFW\ either using a default value, or the related functionality to be disabled. For instance, if \textit{width} and \textit{height} are both zero, \GLFW\ will use a window resolution of 640x480. If \textit{depthbits} is zero, the opened window may not have a depth buffer. The \textit{mode} argument is used to specify if the window is to be a s.c. fullscreen window, or a regular window. If \textit{mode} is GLFW\_FULLSCREEN, the window will cover the entire screen and no window border or decorations will be visible. If possible, the video mode will be changed to the mode that closest matches the \textit{width}, \textit{height}, \textit{redbits}, \textit{greenbits}, \textit{bluebits} and \textit{alphabits} arguments. Furthermore, the mouse pointer will be hidden, and screensavers are prohibited. This is usually the best mode for games and demos. If \textit{mode} is GLFW\_WINDOW, the window will be opened as a normal, decorated window on the desktop. The mouse pointer will not be hidden and screensavers are allowed to be activated. To close the window, you can either use \textbf{glfwTerminate}, as described earlier, or you can use the more explicit approach by calling \textbf{glfwCloseWindow}, which has the C syntax: \begin{lstlisting} void glfwCloseWindow(void) \end{lstlisting} Note that you do not need to call \textbf{glfwTerminate} and \textbf{glfwInit} before opening a new window after having closed the current one using \textbf{glfwCloseWindow}. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \section{Using Keyboard Input} \GLFW\ provides several means for receiving user input, which will be discussed in more detail in chapter \ref{par:inputhandling}. One of the simplest ways of checking for keyboard input is to use the function \textbf{glfwGetKey}: \begin{lstlisting} int glfwGetKey(int key) \end{lstlisting} It queries the current status of individual keyboard keys. The argument \textit{key} specifies which key to check, and it can be either an uppercase printable ISO 8859-1 (Latin 1) character (e.g. `A', `3' or `.'), or a special key identifier (see the \textit{GLFW Reference Manual} for a list of special key identifiers). \textbf{glfwGetKey} returns GLFW\_PRESS if the key is currently held down, or GLFW\_RELEASE if the key is not being held down. For example: \begin{lstlisting} A_pressed = glfwGetKey('A'); esc_pressed = glfwGetKey(GLFW_KEY_ESC); \end{lstlisting} In order for \textbf{glfwGetKey} to have any effect, you need to poll for input events on a regular basis. This can be done in one of two ways: \begin{enumerate} \item Implicitly by calling \textbf{glfwSwapBuffers} often. \item Explicitly by calling \textbf{glfwPollEvents} often. \end{enumerate} In general you do not have to care about this, since you will normally call \textbf{glfwSwapBuffers} to swap front and back rendering buffers every animation frame anyway. If, however, this is not the case, you should call \textbf{glfwPollEvents} in the order of 10-100 times per second in order for \GLFW\ to maintain an up to date input state. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \section{Putting It Together: A Minimal GLFW Application} Now that you know how to initialize \GLFW , open a window and poll for keyboard input, let us exemplify this with a simple \OpenGL\ program: \begin{lstlisting} #include #include int main(void) { int running = GL_TRUE; // Initialize GLFW if (!glfwInit()) exit(EXIT_FAILURE); // Open an OpenGL window if (!glfwOpenWindow(300,300, 0,0,0,0,0,0, GLFW_WINDOW)) { glfwTerminate(); exit(EXIT_FAILURE); } // Main loop while (running) { // OpenGL rendering goes here... glClear(GL_COLOR_BUFFER_BIT); // Swap front and back rendering buffers glfwSwapBuffers(); // Check if ESC key was pressed or window was closed running = !glfwGetKey(GLFW_KEY_ESC) && glfwGetWindowParam(GLFW_OPENED); } // Close window and terminate GLFW glfwTerminate(); // Exit program exit(EXIT_SUCCESS); } \end{lstlisting} The program opens a 300x300 window and runs in a loop until the escape key is pressed, or the window was closed. All the \OpenGL\ ``rendering'' that is done in this example is to clear the window. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- % Window Operations %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \chapter{Window Operations} \thispagestyle{fancy} In this chapter, you will learn more about window related \GLFW\ functionality, including setting and getting window properties, buffer swap control and video mode querying. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \section{Setting Window Properties} In the previous chapter the \textbf{glfwOpenWindow} function was described, which specifies the sizes of the color, alpha, depth and stencil buffers. It is also possible to request a specific minimum OpenGL version, multisampling anti-aliasing, an accumulation buffer, stereo rendering and more by using the \textbf{glfwOpenWindowHint} function: \begin{lstlisting} void glfwOpenWindowHint(int target, int hint) \end{lstlisting} The \textit{target} argument can be one of the constants listed in table~ \ref{tab:winhints}, and \textit{hint} is the value to assign to the specified target. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \begin{table}[p] \begin{center} \begin{tabular}{|l|l|p{7.0cm}|} \hline \raggedright \textbf{Name} & \textbf{Default} & \textbf{Description} \\ \hline GLFW\_REFRESH\_RATE & 0 & Vertical monitor refresh rate in Hz (only used for fullscreen windows). Zero means system default.\\ \hline GLFW\_ACCUM\_RED\_BITS & 0 & Number of bits for the red channel of the accumulation buffer.\\ \hline GLFW\_ACCUM\_GREEN\_BITS & 0 & Number of bits for the green channel of the accumulation buffer.\\ \hline GLFW\_ACCUM\_BLUE\_BITS & 0 & Number of bits for the blue channel of the accumulation buffer.\\ \hline GLFW\_ACCUM\_ALPHA\_BITS & 0 & Number of bits for the alpha channel of the accumulation buffer.\\ \hline GLFW\_AUX\_BUFFERS & 0 & Number of auxiliary buffers.\\ \hline GLFW\_STEREO & GL\_FALSE & Specify if stereo rendering should be supported (can be GL\_TRUE or GL\_FALSE).\\ \hline GLFW\_WINDOW\_NO\_RESIZE & GL\_FALSE & Specify whether the window can be resized by the user (not used for fullscreen windows).\\ \hline GLFW\_FSAA\_SAMPLES & 0 & Number of samples to use for the multisampling buffer. Zero disables multisampling.\\ \hline GLFW\_OPENGL\_VERSION\_MAJOR & 1 & Major number of the desired minimum OpenGL version.\\ \hline GLFW\_OPENGL\_VERSION\_MINOR & 1 & Minor number of the desired minimum OpenGL version.\\ \hline GLFW\_OPENGL\_FORWARD\_COMPAT & GL\_FALSE & Specify whether the OpenGL context should be forward-compatible (i.e. disallow legacy functionality). This should only be used when requesting OpenGL version 3.0 or above.\\ \hline GLFW\_OPENGL\_DEBUG\_CONTEXT & GL\_FALSE & Specify whether a debug context should be created.\\ \hline GLFW\_OPENGL\_PROFILE & 0 & The OpenGL profile the context should implement, or zero to let the system choose. Available profiles are GLFW\_OPENGL\_CORE\_PROFILE and GLFW\_OPENGL\_COMPAT\_PROFILE.\\ \hline \end{tabular} \end{center} \caption{Targets for \textbf{glfwOpenWindowHint}} \label{tab:winhints} \end{table} %------------------------------------------------------------------------- For a hint to have any effect, the \textbf{glfwOpenWindowHint} function must be called before opening the window with the \textbf{glfwOpenWindow} function. To request an accumulation buffer, set the GLFW\_ACCUM\_x\_BITS targets to values greater than zero (usually eight or sixteen bits per component). To request auxiliary buffers, set the GLFW\_AUX\_BUFFERS target to a value greater than zero. To request a stereo rendering capable window, set the GLFW\_STEREO target to GL\_TRUE. If you want to enable fullscreen antialiasing, set the GLFW\_FSAA\_SAMPLES target to a value greater than zero. If the windowing system is unable to fulfil the request, \GLFW\ will degrade gracefully and disable FSAA if necessary. The GLFW\_REFRESH\_RATE target should be used with caution, since it may result in suboptimal operation, or even a blank or damaged screen. If you want to create a forward-compatible \OpenGL\ context, set the GLFW\_OPENGL\_FORWARD\_COMPAT hint to GL\_TRUE. Note that such contexts are only available for \OpenGL\ version 3.0 and above, so you will need to specify a valid minimum version using the GLFW\_OPENGL\_VERSION\_MAJOR and GLFW\_OPENGL\_VERSION\_MINOR hints. If you want to create a context using the core profile as available in \OpenGL\ version 3.2 and above, set the GLFW\_OPENGL\_PROFILE hint accordingly. Note that as above you have to set a valid minimum version for this to work. Also note that at the time of this release, Mac OS X did not support \OpenGL\ version 3.0 or above; thus GLFW cannot create contexts of versions above 2.1 on that platform. Besides the parameters that are given with the \textbf{glfwOpenWindow} and \textbf{glfwOpenWindowHint} functions, a few more properties of a window can be changed after the window has been opened, namely the window title, window size, and window position. To change the window title of an open window, use the \textbf{glfwSetWindowTitle} function: \begin{lstlisting} void glfwSetWindowTitle(const char* title) \end{lstlisting} \textit{title} is a null terminated ISO~8859-1 (8-bit Latin~1) string that will be used as the window title. It will also be used as the application name (for instance in the application list when using \texttt{Alt+Tab} under Windows, or as the icon name when the window is iconified under the X Window System). The default window name is ``GLFW Window'', which will be used unless \textbf{glfwSetWindowTitle} is called after the window has been opened. To change the size of a window, call \textbf{glfwSetWindowSize}: \begin{lstlisting} void glfwSetWindowSize(int width, int height) \end{lstlisting} Where \textit{width} and \textit{height} are the new dimensions of the window. To change the position of a window, call \textbf{glfwSetWindowPos}: \begin{lstlisting} void glfwSetWindowPos(int x, int y) \end{lstlisting} Where \textit{x} and \textit{y} are the new desktop coordinates of the window. This function does not have any effect when in fullscreen mode. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \section{Getting Window Properties} When opening a window, the opened window will not necessarily have the requested properties, so you should always check the parameters that your application relies on (e.g. number of stencil bits) using \textbf{glfwGetWindowParam}, which has the C syntax: \begin{lstlisting} int glfwGetWindowParam(int param) \end{lstlisting} The argument \textit{param} can be one of the tokens listed in table \ref{tab:winparams}, and the return value is an integer holding the requested value. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \begin{table}[p] \begin{center} \begin{tabular}{|l|p{9.5cm}|} \hline \raggedright \textbf{Name} & \textbf{Description} \\ \hline GLFW\_OPENED & GL\_TRUE if window is opened, else GL\_FALSE.\\ \hline GLFW\_ACTIVE & GL\_TRUE if window has focus, else GL\_FALSE.\\ \hline GLFW\_ICONIFIED & GL\_TRUE if window is iconified, else GL\_FALSE.\\ \hline GLFW\_ACCELERATED & GL\_TRUE if window is hardware accelerated, else GL\_FALSE.\\ \hline GLFW\_RED\_BITS & Number of bits for the red color component.\\ \hline GLFW\_GREEN\_BITS & Number of bits for the green color component.\\ \hline GLFW\_BLUE\_BITS & Number of bits for the blue color component.\\ \hline GLFW\_ALPHA\_BITS & Number of bits for the alpha buffer.\\ \hline GLFW\_DEPTH\_BITS & Number of bits for the depth buffer.\\ \hline GLFW\_STENCIL\_BITS & Number of bits for the stencil buffer.\\ \hline GLFW\_REFRESH\_RATE & Vertical monitor refresh rate in Hz. Zero indicates an unknown or a default refresh rate.\\ \hline GLFW\_ACCUM\_RED\_BITS & Number of bits for the red channel of the accumulation buffer.\\ \hline GLFW\_ACCUM\_GREEN\_BITS & Number of bits for the green channel of the accumulation buffer.\\ \hline GLFW\_ACCUM\_BLUE\_BITS & Number of bits for the blue channel of the accumulation buffer.\\ \hline GLFW\_ACCUM\_ALPHA\_BITS & Number of bits for the alpha channel of the accumulation buffer.\\ \hline GLFW\_AUX\_BUFFERS & Number of auxiliary buffers.\\ \hline GLFW\_STEREO & GL\_TRUE if stereo rendering is supported, else GL\_FALSE.\\ \hline GLFW\_WINDOW\_NO\_RESIZE & GL\_TRUE if the window cannot be resized by the user, else GL\_FALSE.\\ \hline GLFW\_FSAA\_SAMPLES & Number of multisampling buffer samples. Zero indicated multisampling is disabled.\\ \hline GLFW\_OPENGL\_VERSION\_MAJOR & Major number of the actual version of the context.\\ \hline GLFW\_OPENGL\_VERSION\_MINOR & Minor number of the actual version of the context.\\ \hline GLFW\_OPENGL\_FORWARD\_COMPAT & GL\_TRUE if the context is forward-compatible, else GL\_FALSE.\\ \hline GLFW\_OPENGL\_DEBUG\_CONTEXT & GL\_TRUE if the context is a debug context.\\ \hline GLFW\_OPENGL\_PROFILE & The profile implemented by the context, or zero.\\ \hline \end{tabular} \end{center} \caption{Window parameters for \textbf{glfwGetWindowParam}} \label{tab:winparams} \end{table} %------------------------------------------------------------------------- Another useful function is \textbf{glfwSetWindowSizeCallback}, which specifies a user function that will be called every time the window size has changed. The C syntax is: \begin{lstlisting} void glfwSetWindowSizeCallback(GLFWwindowsizefun cbfun) \end{lstlisting} The user function \textit{fun} should be of the type: \begin{lstlisting} void fun(int width, int height) \end{lstlisting} The first argument passed to the user function is the width of the window, and the second argument is the height of the window. Here is an example of how to use a window size callback function: \begin{lstlisting} int windowWidth, windowHeight; void WindowResize(int width, int height) { windowWidth = width; windowHeight = height; } int main(void) { ... glfwSetWindowSizeCallback(WindowResize); ... } \end{lstlisting} Using a callback function for getting the window size is mostly useful for windowed applications, since the window size may be changed at any time by the user. It can also be used to determine the actual fullscreen resolution. An alternative to using a callback function for getting the window size, is to use the function \textbf{glfwGetWindowSize}: \begin{lstlisting} void glfwGetWindowSize(int* width, int* height) \end{lstlisting} The variables pointed to by \textit{width} and \textit{height} are set to the current window dimensions. Note that either of these may be NULL; that argument is then ignored. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \section{Buffer Swapping} \GLFW\ windows are always double buffered. That means that you have two rendering buffers; a front buffer and a back buffer. The front buffer is the buffer that is being displayed, and the back buffer is not displayed. \OpenGL\ lets you select which of these two buffers you want to render to (with the \textbf{glDrawBuffer} command), but the default (and preferred) rendering buffer is the back buffer. This way you will avoid flickering and artifacts caused by graphics being only partly drawn at the same time as the video raster beam is displaying the graphics on the monitor. When an entire frame has been rendered to the back buffer, it is time to swap the back and the front buffers in order to display the rendered frame, and begin rendering a new frame. This is done with the command \textbf{glfwSwapBuffers}. The C syntax is: \begin{lstlisting} void glfwSwapBuffers(void) \end{lstlisting} After swapping the front and back rendering buffers, \textbf{glfwSwapBuffers} by default calls \textbf{glfwPollEvents}\footnote{This behavior can be disabled by calling \textbf{glfwDisable} with the argument GLFW\_AUTO\_POLL\_EVENTS.}. This is to ensure frequent polling of events, such as keyboard and mouse input, and window reshaping events. Even if a given application does not use input events, without frequent polling of events (at \emph{least} once every few seconds), most modern window systems will flag the application as unresponsive and may suggest that the user terminate it. Sometimes it can be useful to select when the buffer swap will occur. With the function \textbf{glfwSwapInterval} it is possible to select the minimum number of vertical retraces the video raster line should do before swapping the buffers: \begin{lstlisting} void glfwSwapInterval(int interval) \end{lstlisting} If \textit{interval} is zero, the swap will take place immediately when \textbf{glfwSwapBuffers} is called, without waiting for a vertical retrace (also known as ``vsync off''). Otherwise at least \textit{interval} retraces will pass between each buffer swap (also known as ``vsync on''). Using a swap interval of zero can be useful for benchmarking purposes, when it is not desirable to measure the time it takes to wait for the vertical retrace. However, a swap interval of 1 generally gives better visual quality. It should be noted that not all \OpenGL\ implementations and hardware support this function, in which case \textbf{glfwSwapInterval} will have no effect. ATI Radeon cards under Microsoft Windows are especially notorious in this regard. Sometimes it is only possible to affect the swap interval through driver settings (e.g. the display settings under Windows, or as an environment variable setting under Unix). %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \section{Querying Video Modes} Although \GLFW\ generally does a good job at selecting a suitable video mode for you when you open a fullscreen window, it is sometimes useful to know exactly which modes are available on a certain system. For example, you may want to present the user with a list of video modes to select from. To get a list of available video modes, you can use the function \textbf{glfwGetVideoModes}: \begin{lstlisting} int glfwGetVideoModes(GLFWvidmode* list, int maxcount) \end{lstlisting} The argument \textit{list} is a vector of GLFWvidmode structures, and \textit{maxcount} is the maximum number of video modes that your vector can hold. \textbf{glfwGetVideoModes} will return the number of video modes detected on the system, up to \textit{maxcount}. The GLFWvidmode structure looks like this: \begin{lstlisting} typedef struct { int Width, Height; // Video resolution int RedBits; // Red bits per pixel int GreenBits; // Green bits per pixel int BlueBits; // Blue bits per pixel } GLFWvidmode; \end{lstlisting} Here is an example of retrieving all available video modes: \begin{lstlisting} int nummodes; GLFWvidmode list[200]; nummodes = glfwGetVideoModes(list, 200); \end{lstlisting} The returned list is sorted, first by color depth ($RedBits + GreenBits + BlueBits$), and then by resolution ($Width\times Height$), with the lowest resolution, fewest bits per pixel mode first. To get the desktop video mode, use the function \textbf{glfwGetDesktopMode}: \begin{lstlisting} void glfwGetDesktopMode(GLFWvidmode* mode) \end{lstlisting} The function returns the resolution and color depth of the user desktop in the mode structure. Note that the user desktop mode is independent of the current video mode if a \GLFW\ fullscreen window has been opened. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- % Input Handling %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \chapter{Input Handling} \label{par:inputhandling} \thispagestyle{fancy} In this chapter you will learn how to use keyboard, mouse and joystick input, using either polling or callback functions. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \section{Event Polling} The first thing to know about input handling in \GLFW\ is that all keyboard and mouse input is collected by checking for input events. This has do be done manually by calling either \textbf{glfwPollEvents} or \textbf{glfwSwapBuffers} (which implicitly calls \textbf{glfwPollEvents} for you). Normally this is not a cause for concern, as \textbf{glfwSwapBuffers} is called every frame, which should be often enough (about 10-100 times per second for a normal \OpenGL\ application) that the window will feel responsive. One exception is when an application is updating its view only in response to input. In this case the \textbf{glfwWaitEvents} is useful, as it blocks the calling thread until an event arrives. The refresh callback, set with \textbf{glfwSetWindowRefreshCallback}, may also be useful for such applications, especially on unbuffered window systems. If it is not desirable that \textbf{glfwPollEvents is} called implicitly from \textbf{glfwSwapBuffers}, call \textbf{glfwDisable} with the argument GLFW\_AUTO\_POLL\_EVENTS. Note that event polling is not needed for joystick input, since all relevant joystick state is gathered every time a joystick function is called. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \section{Keyboard Input} \GLFW\ provides three mechanisms for getting keyboard input: \begin{itemize} \item Manually polling the state of individual keys. \item Automatically receive new key state for any key, using a callback function. \item Automatically receive characters, using a callback function. \end{itemize} Depending on what the keyboard input will be used for, different methods may be preferred. The main difference between the two last methods is that while characters are affected by modifier keys (such as shift), key state is independent of any modifier keys. Also, special keys (such as function keys, cursor keys and modifier keys) are not reported to the character callback function. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \subsection{Key state} To check if a key is held down or not at any given moment, use the function \textbf{glfwGetKey}: \begin{lstlisting} int glfwGetKey(int key) \end{lstlisting} It queries the current status of individual keyboard keys. The argument \textit{key} specifies which key to check, and it can be either an uppercase ISO~8859-1 character, or a special key identifier. \textbf{glfwGetKey} returns GLFW\_PRESS (or 1) if the key is currently held down, or GLFW\_RELEASE (or 0) if the key is not being held down. In most situations, it may be useful to know if a key has been pressed and released between two calls to \textbf{glfwGetKey} (especially if the animation is fairly slow, which may allow the user to press and release a key between two calls to \textbf{glfwGetKey}). This can be accomplished by enabling sticky keys, which is done by calling \textbf{glfwEnable} with the argument GLFW\_STICKY\_KEYS, as in the following example: \begin{lstlisting} glfwEnable(GLFW_STICKY_KEYS); \end{lstlisting} When sticky keys are enabled, a key will not be released until it is checked with \textbf{glfwGetKey}. To disable sticky keys, call \textbf{glfwDisable} witht the argument GLFW\_STICKY\_KEYS. Then all keys that are not currently held down will be released and future key releases will take place immediately when the user releases the key without waiting for \textbf{glfwGetKey} to check the key. By default sticky keys are disabled. Sticky keys are often very useful and should be used in most cases where \textbf{glfwGetKey} is used. There is however a danger involved with enabling sticky keys, and that is that keys that are pressed by the user but are not checked with \textbf{glfwGetKey}, may remain ``pressed'' for a very long time. A typical situation where this may be dangerous is in a program that consists of two or more sections (e.g. a menu section and a game section). If the first section enables sticky keys but does not check for keys which the second section checks for, there is a potential of recording many key presses in the first section that will be detected in the second section. To avoid this problem, always disable sticky keys before leaving a section of a program. A usually better alternative to using \textbf{glfwGetKey} is to register a keyboard input callback function with \textbf{glfwSetKeyCallback}: \begin{lstlisting} void glfwSetKeyCallback(GLFWkeyfun cbfun) \end{lstlisting} The argument \textit{fun} is a pointer to a callback function. The callback function shall take two integer arguments. The first is the key identifier, and the second is the new key state, which can be GLFW\_PRESS or GLFW\_RELEASE. To unregister a callback function, call \textbf{glfwSetKeyCallback} with \textit{fun} = NULL. Using the callback function, you can be sure not to miss any key press or release events, regardless of how many may have occurred during the last frame. It also encourages event-based design, where the application responds only to actual events instead of having to poll for every supported event. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \subsection{Character input} If the keyboard is to be used as a text input device (e.g. in a user dialog) rather than as a set of independent buttons, a character callback function is more suitable. To register a character callback function, use \textbf{glfwSetCharCallback}: \begin{lstlisting} void glfwSetCharCallback(GLFWcharfun cbfun) \end{lstlisting} The argument \textit{fun} is a pointer to a callback function. The callback function shall take two integer arguments. The first is a Unicode code point, and the second is GLFW\_PRESS if the key that generated the character was pressed, or GLFW\_RELEASE if it was released. To unregister a callback function, call \textbf{glfwSetCharCallback} with \textit{fun} = NULL. The Unicode character set is an international standard for encoding characters. It is much more comprehensive than seven or eight bit character sets (e.g. US-ASCII and Latin~1), and includes characters for most written languages in the world. It should be noted that Unicode character codes 0 to 255 are the same as for ISO~8859-1 (Latin~1), so as long as a proper range check is performed on the Unicode character code, it can be used just as an eight bit Latin~1 character code (which can be useful if full Unicode support is not possible). %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \subsection{Key repeat} By default, \GLFW\ does not report key repeats when a key is held down. To activate key repeat, call \textbf{glfwEnable} with the argument GLFW\_KEY\_REPEAT: \begin{lstlisting} glfwEnable(GLFW_KEY_REPEAT); \end{lstlisting} This will let a registered key or character callback function receive key repeat events when a key is held down. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \subsection{Special system keys} On most systems there are some special system keys that are normally not intercepted by an application. For instance, under Windows it is possible to switch programs by pressing \texttt{ALT+TAB}, which brings up a list of running programs to select from. In certain situations it can be desirable to prevent such special system keys from interfering with the program. With \GLFW\ it is possible to do by calling \textbf{glfwDisable} with the argument GLFW\_SYSTEM\_KEYS: \begin{lstlisting} glfwDisable(GLFW_SYSTEM_KEYS); \end{lstlisting} By doing so, most system keys will have no effect and will not interfere with your program. System keys can be re-enabled by calling \textbf{glfwEnable} with the argument GLFW\_SYSTEM\_KEYS. By default, system keys are enabled. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \section{Mouse Input} Just like for keyboard input, mouse input can be realized with either polling or callback functions. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \subsection{Mouse position} To query the position of the mouse cursor, call \textbf{glfwGetMousePos}: \begin{lstlisting} void glfwGetMousePos(int* x, int* y) \end{lstlisting} The variables pointed to by \textit{x} and \textit{y} will be updated with the current position of the mouse cursor relative to the upper-left corner of the client area of the \GLFW\ window. An alternative is to use a callback function, which can be set with \textbf{glfwSetMousePosCallback}: \begin{lstlisting} void glfwSetMousePosCallback(GLFWmouseposfun cbfun) \end{lstlisting} The function that \textit{fun} points to will be called every time the mouse cursor moves. The first argument to the callback function is the cursor x-coordinate and the second the cursor y-coordinate, both relative to the upper-left corner of the client area of the \GLFW\ window. Note that while the \textbf{glfwGetMousePos} function only reports the final position after cursor movement events have been processed, using a callback function lets the application see each and every such event. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \subsection{Mouse buttons} To query the state of a mouse button, call \textbf{glfwGetMouseButton}: \begin{lstlisting} int glfwGetMouseButton(int button) \end{lstlisting} The argument \textit{button} can be any \GLFW\ mouse button token, i.e. GLFW\_MOUSE\_BUTTON\_1 through GLFW\_MOUSE\_BUTTON\_8 or one of GLFW\_MOUSE\_BUTTON\_LEFT, GLFW\_MOUSE\_BUTTON\_RIGHT or GLFW\_MOUSE\_BUTTON\_MIDDLE. \textbf{glfwGetMouseButton} will return GLFW\_PRESS (which is a non-zero value) if the corresponding mouse button is held down, otherwise it will return GLFW\_RELEASE (which is equal to zero). Just as it is possible to make keys ``sticky'', it is also possible to make each mouse button appear as held down until it is checked with \textbf{glfwGetMouseButton}. To enable sticky mouse buttons, call \textbf{glfwEnable} with the argument GLFW\_STICKY\_MOUSE\_BUTTONS. When sticky mouse buttons are enabled, a mouse button will not be released until it is checked with \textbf{glfwGetMouseButton}. To disable sticky mouse buttons, call \textbf{glfwDisable} with the argument GLFW\_STICKY\_MOUSE\_BUTTONS. Then all mouse buttons that are not currently held down will be released and future mouse button releases will take place immediately when the user releases the mouse button without waiting for \textbf{glfwGetMouseButton} to check for the mouse button. By default sticky mouse buttons are disabled. There is also a callback function for mouse button activities, which can be set with \textbf{glfwSetMouseButtonCallback}: \begin{lstlisting} void glfwSetMouseButtonCallback(GLFWmousebuttonfun fun) \end{lstlisting} The argument \textit{fun} specifies a function that will be called whenever a mouse button is pressed or released, or NULL to unregister a callback function. The first argument to the callback function is a mouse button identifier, and the second is either GLFW\_PRESS or GLFW\_RELEASE, depending on the new state of the corresponding mouse button. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \subsection{Mouse wheel} Some mice have a mouse wheel, most commonly used for vertical scrolling. Also, most modern touchpads allow the user to scroll at least vertically, either by reserving an area for scrolling or through multi-finger gestures. To get the position of the mouse wheel, call \textbf{glfwGetMouseWheel}: \begin{lstlisting} int glfwGetMouseWheel(void) \end{lstlisting} The function returns an integer that represents the position of the mouse wheel. When the user turns the wheel, the wheel position will increase or decrease. Note that since scrolling hardware has no absolute position, \GLFW\ simply sets the position to zero when the window is opened. It is also possible to register a callback function for mouse wheel events with the \textbf{glfwSetMouseWheelCallback} function: \begin{lstlisting} void glfwSetMouseWheelCallback(GLFWmousewheelfun fun) \end{lstlisting} The argument \textit{fun} specifies a function that will be called whenever the mouse wheel is moved, or NULL to unregister a callback function. The argument to the callback function is the position of the mouse wheel. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \subsection{Hiding the mouse cursor} It is possible to hide the mouse cursor with the function call: \begin{lstlisting} glfwDisable(GLFW_MOUSE_CURSOR); \end{lstlisting} Hiding the mouse cursor has three effects: \begin{enumerate} \item The cursor becomes invisible. \item The cursor is guaranteed to be confined to the window. \item Mouse coordinates are not limited to the window size. \end{enumerate} To show the mouse cursor again, call \textbf{glfwEnable} with the argument GLFW\_MOUSE\_CURSOR: \begin{lstlisting} glfwEnable(GLFW_MOUSE_CURSOR); \end{lstlisting} By default the mouse cursor is hidden if a window is opened in fullscreen mode, otherwise it is not hidden. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \section{Joystick Input} \GLFW\ has support for up to sixteen joysticks, and an infinite\footnote{% There are of course actual limitations posed by the underlying hardware, drivers and operation system.} number of axes and buttons per joystick. Unlike keyboard and mouse input, joystick input does not need an opened window, and \textbf{glfwPollEvents} or \textbf{glfwSwapBuffers} does not have to be called in order for joystick state to be updated. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \subsection{Joystick capabilities} First, it is often necessary to determine if a joystick is connected and what its capabilities are. To get this information the function \textbf{glfwGetJoystickParam} can be used: \begin{lstlisting} int glfwGetJoystickParam(int joy, int param) \end{lstlisting} The \textit{joy} argument specifies which joystick to retrieve the parameter from, and it should be GLFW\_JOYSTICK\_\textit{n}, where \textit{n} is in the range 1 to 16. The \textit{param} argument specifies which parameter to retrieve. To determine if a joystick is connected, \textit{param} should be GLFW\_PRESENT, which will cause the function to return GL\_TRUE if the joystick is connected, or GL\_FALSE if it is not. To determine the number of axes or buttons that are supported by the joystick, \textit{param} should be GLFW\_AXES or GLFW\_BUTTONS, respectively. Note that \GLFW\ supports both D-pads and POVs, even though they are not explicitly mentioned in the API. D-pads are exposed as a set of four buttons and POVs are as two axes. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \subsection{Joystick position} To get the current axis positions of the joystick, the \textbf{glfwGetJoystickPos} is used: \begin{lstlisting} int glfwGetJoystickPos(int joy, float* pos, int numaxes) \end{lstlisting} As with \textbf{glfwGetJoystickParam}, the \textit{joy} argument specifies which joystick to retrieve information from. The \textit{numaxes} argument specifies how many axes to return positions for and the \textit{pos} argument specifies an array in which they are stored. The function returns the actual number of axes that were returned, which could be less than \textit{numaxes} if the joystick does not support all the requested axes, or if the joystick is not connected. For instance, to get the position of the first two axes (the X and Y axes) of joystick 1, the following code can be used: \begin{lstlisting} float position[2]; glfwGetJoystickPos(GLFW_JOYSTICK_1, position, 2); \end{lstlisting} After this call, the first element of the \textit{position} array will hold the X axis position of the joystick, and the second element will hold the Y axis position. In this example we do not use the information about how many axes were really returned. The position of an axis can be in the range -1.0 to 1.0, where positive values represent right, forward or up directions, while negative values represent left, back or down directions. If a requested axis is not supported by the joystick, the corresponding array element will be set to zero. The same goes for the situation when the joystick is not connected (all axes are treated as unsupported). %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \subsection{Joystick buttons} A function similar to the \textbf{glfwGetJoystickPos} function is available for querying the state of joystick buttons, namely the \textbf{glfwGetJoystickButtons} function: \begin{lstlisting} int glfwGetJoystickButtons(int joy, unsigned char* buttons, int numbuttons) \end{lstlisting} The function works just like the \textbf{glfwGetJoystickAxis} function, except that it returns the state of joystick buttons instead of axis positions. Each button in the array specified by the \textit{buttons} argument can be either GLFW\_PRESS or GLFW\_RELEASE, indicating whether the corresponding button is currently held down or not. Unsupported buttons will have the value GLFW\_RELEASE. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- % Timing %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \chapter{Timing} \thispagestyle{fancy} %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \section{High Resolution Timer} In most applications, it is useful to know exactly how much time has passed between point $A$ and point $B$ in a program. A typical situation is in a game, where you need to know how much time has passed between two rendered frames in order to calculate the correct movement and physics etc. Another example is when you want to benchmark a certain piece of code. \GLFW\ provides a high-resolution timer, which reports a double precision floating point value representing the number of seconds that have passed since \textbf{glfwInit} was called. The timer is accessed with the function \textbf{glfwGetTime}: \begin{lstlisting} double glfwGetTime(void) \end{lstlisting} The precision of the timer depends on which computer and operating system you are running, but it is almost guaranteed to be better than $10~ms$, and in most cases it is much better than $1~ms$ (on a modern PC you can get resolutions in the order of $1~ns$). It is possible to set the value of the high precision timer using the \textbf{glfwSetTime} function: \begin{lstlisting} void glfwSetTime(double time) \end{lstlisting} The argument \textit{time} is the time, in seconds, that the timer should be set to. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- % OpenGL Extension Support %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \chapter{OpenGL Extension Support} \thispagestyle{fancy} One of the benefits of \OpenGL\ is that it is extensible. Independent hardware vendors (IHVs) may include functionality in their \OpenGL\ implementations that exceed that of the \OpenGL\ standard. An extension is defined by: \begin{enumerate} \item An extension name (e.g. GL\_ARB\_multitexture). \item New OpenGL tokens (e.g. GL\_TEXTURE1\_ARB). \item New OpenGL functions (e.g. \textbf{glActiveTextureARB}). \end{enumerate} A list of official extensions, together with their definitions, can be found at the \textit{OpenGL Registry} (\url{http://www.opengl.org/registry/}). To use a certain extension, the following steps must be performed: \begin{enumerate} \item A compile time check for the support of the extension. \item A run time check for the support of the extension. \item Fetch function pointers for the extended \OpenGL\ functions (done at run time). \end{enumerate} How this is done using \GLFW\ is described in the following sections. Please note that this chapter covers some advanced topics, and is quite specific to the C programming language. For a much easier way to get access to \OpenGL\ extensions, you should probably use a dedicated extension loading library such as GLEW or GLee. This kind of library greatly reduces the amount of work necessary to use \OpenGL\ extensions. GLEW in particular has been extensively tested with and works well with \GLFW . %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \section{Compile Time Check} The compile time check is necessary to perform in order to know if the compiler include files have defined the necessary tokens. It is very easy to do. The include file \texttt{GL/gl.h} will define a constant with the same name as the extension, if all the extension tokens are defined. Here is an example of how to check for the extension GL\_ARB\_multitexture: \begin{lstlisting} #ifdef GL_ARB_multitexture // Extension is supported by the include files #else // Extension is not supported by the include files // Get a more up-to-date file! #endif \end{lstlisting} %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \section{Runtime Check} Even if the compiler include files have defined all the necessary tokens, a given machine may not actually support the extension (it may have a graphics card with a different \OpenGL\ implementation, or an older driver). That is why it is necessary to do a run time check for the extension support as well. This is done with the \GLFW\ function \textbf{glfwExtensionSupported}, which has the C syntax: \begin{lstlisting} int glfwExtensionSupported(const char* extension) \end{lstlisting} The argument \textit{extension} is a null terminated ASCII string with the extension name. \textbf{glfwExtensionSupported} returns GL\_TRUE if the extension is supported, otherwise it returns GL\_FALSE. Let us extend the previous example of checking for support of the extension GL\_ARB\_multitexture. This time we add a run time check, and a variable which we set to GL\_TRUE if the extension is supported, or GL\_FALSE if it is not supported. \begin{lstlisting} int multitexture_supported; #ifdef GL_ARB_multitexture // Check if extension is supported at run time multitexture_supported = glfwExtensionSupported("GL_ARB_multitexture"); #else // Extension is not supported by the include files // Get a more up-to-date file! multitexture_supported = GL_FALSE; #endif \end{lstlisting} Now it is easy to check for the extension within the program, simply do: \begin{lstlisting} if (multitexture_supported) { // Use multi texturing } else { // Use some other solution (or fail) } \end{lstlisting} %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \section{Fetching Function Pointers} Some extensions, though not all, require the use of new \OpenGL\ functions. These entry points are not necessarily exposed by your link libraries, making it necessary to find them dynamically at run time. You can retrieve these entry points using the \textbf{glfwGetProcAddress} function: \begin{lstlisting} void* glfwGetProcAddress(const char* procname) \end{lstlisting} The argument \textit{procname} is a null terminated ASCII string holding the name of the \OpenGL\ function. \textbf{glfwGetProcAddress} returns the address to the function if the function is available, otherwise NULL is returned. Obviously, fetching the function pointer is trivial. For instance, if we want to obtain the pointer to \textbf{glActiveTextureARB}, we simply call: \begin{lstlisting} glActiveTextureARB = glfwGetProcAddress("glActiveTextureARB"); \end{lstlisting} However, there are many possible naming and type definition conflicts involved with such an operation, which may result in compiler warnings or errors. My proposed solution is the following: \begin{itemize} \item Do not use the function name for the variable name. Use something similar, perhaps by adding a prefix or suffix, and then use \texttt{\#define} to map the function name to your variable. \item The standard type definition naming convention for function pointers is \texttt{PFN\textit{xxxx}PROC}, where \texttt{\textit{xxxx}} is the uppercase version of the function name (e.g. \texttt{PFNGLACTIVETEXTUREARBPROC}). Either make sure your compiler uses a compatible \texttt{gl.h} and/or \texttt{glext.h} file and rely on it to define these types, or use define the types yourself using a different naming convention (for example \texttt{\textit{xxxx}\_T}) and do the type definitions yourself. \end{itemize} Here is a slightly longer example of how to use an extension, this time using our own function pointer type definition): \begin{lstlisting} // Type definition of the function pointer typedef void (APIENTRY * GLACTIVETEXTUREARB_T) (GLenum texture); // Function pointer GLACTIVETEXTUREARB_T _ActiveTextureARB; #define glActiveTextureARB _ActiveTextureARB // Extension availability flag int multitexture_supported; #ifdef GL_ARB_multitexture // Check if extension is supported at run time if (glfwExtensionSupported("GL_ARB_multitexture")) { // Get the function pointer glActiveTextureARB = (GLACTIVETEXTUREARB_T) glfwGetProcAddress("glActiveTextureARB"); multitexture_supported = GL_TRUE; } else { multitexture_supported = GL_FALSE; } #else // Extension is not supported by the include files multitexture_supported = GL_FALSE; #endif \end{lstlisting} Even this example leaves some things to be desired. First of all, the GL\_ARB\_multitexture extension defines many more functions than the single function used above. Secondly, checking if an extension is supported using \textbf{glfwExtensionSupported} is not enough to ensure that the corresponding functions will be valid. You also need to check that the all function pointers returned by \textbf{glfwGetProcAddress} are non-NULL. %------------------------------------------------------------------------- \subsection{Function pointer type definitions} To make a function pointer type definition, you need to know the function prototype. This can often be found in the extension definitions (e.g. at the \textit{OpenGL Registry}). All the entry points that are defined by an extension are listed with their C prototype definitions under the section \textit{New Procedures and Functions} in the extension definition. For instance, if we look at the definition of the GL\_ARB\_texture\_compression extension, we find a list of new functions. One of these is declared like this: \begin{lstlisting} void GetCompressedTexImageARB(enum target, int lod, void* img); \end{lstlisting} Like in most official \OpenGL\ documentation, all the \texttt{GL} and \texttt{gl} prefixes have been left out. In other words, the real function prototype would look like this: \begin{lstlisting} void glGetCompressedTexImageARB(GLenum target, GLint lod, void* img); \end{lstlisting} All we have to do to turn this prototype definition into a function pointer type definition, is to replace the function name with \texttt{(APIENTRY * \textit{xxxx}\_T)}, where \textit{xxxx} is the uppercase version of the name (according to the proposed naming convention). The keyword \texttt{APIENTRY} is needed to be compatible between different platforms. The \GLFW\ header file \texttt{GL/glfw.h} ensures that \texttt{APIENTRY} is properly defined on all supported platforms. In other words, for the function \textbf{glGetCompressedTexImageARB} we get: \begin{lstlisting} typedef void (APIENTRY * GLGETCOMPRESSEDTEXIMAGEARB_T) (GLenum target, GLint level, void* img); \end{lstlisting} \end{document}