RISC OS News on Drobe
RISC OS Search
containing
"Please give the Castle bashing a break... please!"
Welcome back guest  |  Login  |  Register Friday 29th August 
Login

drobe.co.uk
About Drobe
RISC OS News
Drobe Features
Alternatives
Bookmarks
Riscos.org.uk
Auctions
Events (shows)
AU issues
Tech Material
Wallpaper
Movies
File archives
SH eBooks
FAQs
Changelog

Interact
Forums
Online chat
Your webspace
BBC Emu(games!)
User gallery
RSS news &
comments
Submit news
Contact us

Quick Links
Open directory
Nutshells
ANS archives
ArcSite
RO Repository
Announce
RISCOS Ltd.
Castle

NTK
The Inquirer
The Register
OSNews
Slashdot
Google

Alternatives
NetBSD
ARM Linux
Iyonix Linux

Found Apps
 RISC OS Software !Avalanche
 RISC OS Software !Darts
 RISC OS Software !CFuncAnal
 RISC OS Software !TranTIFF+
 RISC OS Software !Dustbin
 RISC OS Software !NurseW
 RISC OS Software !Tally
 RISC OS Software !VideoLog
 RISC OS Software !USBKick
 RISC OS Software !Spr2Jpeg
Recent users
flypig is a RISC OS User flypig
IanK is a RISC OS User IanK
Mart is a RISC OS User Mart
barti is a RISC OS User barti
rmac is a RISC OS User rmac
diomus is a RISC OS User diomus
bluenose is a RISC OS User bluenose
MartinA is a RISC OS User MartinA
DaveW is a RISC OS User DaveW
jamesp is a RISC OS User jamesp


Why donate?

Serving: 15GB
Fuel: caffeine
0 users online
24 guests
152 active accts 24329 comments

Webstats

 
RISC OS News Article
Hardware accelerated 3D graphics approaching
Published: 5th Jul 2005, 12:00:38GMT  Source: drobe.co.uk
By Chris Williams
Page 1 of 1
Coming "soon" to an Iyonix near you [Updated]
Mesa Teapot example modelHardware accelerated 3D graphics on RISC OS took a step closer to reality, thanks to Simon Wilson. Simon, who authored PCITV, claims to have ported Mesa 3.2, a 3D graphics library that sports an OpenGL software interface. More importantly, he says he has also ported an Nvidia graphics accelerator from BeOS to harness the GeForce2 video card in the Iyonix to plot graphics fast in hardware.

The software is, according to Simon, in a "pre-alpha" stage and will eventually release the software under the GPL. A previous port of Mesa performed its graphics operations in software and was ultimately, painfully slow. Graphics drawn by the dedicated Nvidia chipset are expected to be lighting fast in comparison.

He said: "The first image rendered was the classic OpenGL teapot. The driver is capable of double-buffering, texturing (including mip-mapping), lighting and shading, all in hardware. It also provides a number of 2D functions such as sprite cacheing and plotting, which may be provided as a library for 2D games."

Downloads and source code are said to appear on a website "soon". We also understand that the developer of Geminus is considering adding 2D hardware acceleration to his RISC OS 5 display driver.

Update at 15:21 5/7/2005

Simon tells us that a demo application of the new software is a few days away, whereas the driver is a possibly two to three weeks away.

On the subject of speed and benchmarks, Simon explained, "I have not yet had time to perform and speed measurements. The driver is capable of around 120fps in 1024 x 768 x 32bpp with the OpenGL teapot on x86 hardware, but we don't have floating point hardware on the Iyonix, and Mesa makes heavy use of floating point for transformations.

"The first phase will be to speed up the driver as it currently stands, and then to move to fixed point. The move to fixed point (as opposed to floating point) will likely be a moderate task, but hopefully I can gather some help."

He added: "Well-written games could certainly hold off on converting to floating point till the last minute and perhaps use a table lookup. Sending vertices to the graphics card in floating point is not much different to sending them in fixed point (they both typically use 4 bytes per coordinate)."

He is also willing to put the software under the LGPL licence until there is "proper ELF support in RISC OS". Whilst Simon would like the driver to be free software, he says he will not require games built with the library to be forced to follow the GPL.

Links
Send us news

Related articles
ARM absorbs graphics processor firm
Geminus graphics acceleration launched
Geminus graphics acceleration in beta

This article has been linked to, or is available in the following formats:  
 
 
 
 
 
[Printable] [Digg this] [Blog search]


piemmm(valued user) (+1.5)
Face
5/7/05 12:41PM
Now thats cool. Something that RISC OS has been lacking for a long time has been proper 3D acceleration in hardware. Hopefully (and inferring this from the article) other 'drivers' can be done (depending on how easy it is to get the info on the gfx card, etc, etc) to enable this kind of thing with other cards too.
But one step at a time,.. How long before we see a RISC OS game that makes use of this? :)
nunfetishist(valued user) (+3.5)
5/7/05 2:12PM
In reply to piemmm:
I imagine the first things that might be done are GL conversions of things like the Doom engine, and the Quake engine.
Hertzsprung(valued user)www (+1.5)
5/7/05 2:43PM
There's a thread on The Iconbar http://www.iconbar.com/forums/viewthread.php?threadid=6637 where this project is being discussed.
em2ac(good user) 
5/7/05 3:25PM
oooo OpenGL.....nice :@D

Is it software re-lease season again ;@)
nijinsky(good user) (+1.5)
5/7/05 3:35PM
Excellent.

Well done Simon. Just the perfect thing for embedded medical imaging in things like realtime 3D dopler ultrasound. Hint at a market. :-)

All the best
Bob
flypig(valued user) 
Face
5/7/05 3:58PM
This is really great news! Getting Mesa working and usable from RISC OS would be great for the platform, but getting it accelerated too, that would be exceptional. Kudos to Simon.

As Bob suggests, I'm sure this could lead the way for some really interesting new software releases, as well as opening the door for game ports.
mrchocky(valued user) (+1.5)
Face
5/7/05 4:17PM
What is the relevance of the GPL here? Unless of course, this applies to the BeOS nVIDIA (note caps) driver which jmb notes is rather unclear. Why does ELF change this?
ksattic(valued user) (+5.7)
5/7/05 4:28PM
In reply to Peter:
some advice in this area would be appreciated. I wish for the port to be made freely available for everyone to use, including source. Mesa is under the XFree86 licence. The licence of the nVIDIA driver is unclear. Using ELF was an idea of mine to allow applications to link in at runtime, following a message on the Icon Bar thread regarding LGPL. I thought this would sidestep the need to include the source of any games using the library, but it looks like I was mistaken. I am not sure of the best way to proceed without stepping on any toes. I believe just using the same licensing model as the BeOS people used (the origin of the driver) would be an OK way to go for now.
mrchocky(valued user) (+3.2)
Face
5/7/05 5:53PM
Which fool is modding me down? The specific licencing remains an important issue for RISC OS software, and Simon is correct to seek advice if he doesn't understand it properly. There was a good reason that the GCCSDK developers have invested and continue to invest a good deal of time
ensuring we're following it correctly, and making it easy for others to do so.

My advice to Simon is to lean on the BeOS developers to ensure that their licence is much clearer, perhaps by pointing out its uptake on non-x86 platforms will be easier if it is. LGPL remains a sensible choice for your own work if it's compatible with what they've done or are planning to do.
jmb(good user) (+6.9)
5/7/05 6:00PM
ELF in itself changes nothing. Dynamic linking changes the situation dramatically, however ;)

The overriding factor when considering Mesa licensing is the LGPL (unless, of course, you strip the LGPL bits from it ;) For a reasonably plain-English explanation of the implications of this, see [Link: gccsdk.riscos.info]
The recommended reading sections of the above document are also worth a look.

The licensing status of the BeOS driver code does appear to be somewhat vague - parts (mainly interface with the BeOS driver architecture) are licensed under the Be Sample Code Licence (a copy of which may be found at [Link: linux.inf.elte.hu])
This looks very similar to 3-clause BSD to me.

As for the rest of the driver (i.e. the bits that actually do the work) it's somewhat less obvious as there's no clear copyright/licensing statement in the source code or surrounding files. This page, however, appears to suggest that it's BSD/MIT licensed (although I'd be inclined to email the author and check) - http://www.bebits.com/app/3636
petermcc (+1.7)
6/7/05 11:50AM
Another step forward is always welcome.

Well done Simon.
For our purposes, anything RO that gets closer to a 3D environment for simple architectural modelling is appreciated.

Does this mean that previous softwares such as TopModel will enjoy a new lease of life, I think X-ample are about to re-release it. Maybe they'd like to play with this addition?

(BTW, their website renders strangely under !Netsurf, weird when they claim to be very 'AnyOS Browser' friendly).
phoudoin (+6.8)
7/7/05 3:19PM
About Rudolf Cornelissen's BeOS nVIDIA 3D driver (http://www.bebits.com/app/4129) :

That's not easy to find out, but his driver is part of Haiku (http://www.haiku-os.org/) project, and is licenced under Haiku license terms. Which is basicly a BSD/MIT license.
Like Mesa core source.
So, nothing to worry there, really, guys.
But a short email to notify Rudolf about your port can't hurt, and even will make him both happy and interested.

- Philippe Houdoin, Haiku's OpenGL kit team leader.
phoudoin (+3.5)
7/7/05 3:43PM
BTW, I've just sent a quick email to Rudolf to tell him about your port. Maybe he could give you some hints...
ksattic(valued user) (+3.5)
7/7/05 5:41PM
Thanks for the info there, Philippe! I will make sure to get in touch with Rudolf asap. This is good news about the licensing - it will ensure the software remains free.
flypig(valued user) (+4.2)
Face
10/7/05 1:36PM
Just spotted this interview with Simon Wilson about his RISC OS Mesa port on Haiku News:

http://haikunews.org/1085

It's good to have a bit of celebrity in RO land ;)
1 comment(s) are below your moderation threshold. Login to view them.
 

Top Tip

Wallpaper

Download wallpapers for your desktop and contribute your own to our database
 
Headline news
Wakefield 2008 show photos
28th Apr 2008

Wakefield 2008 show live news
26th Apr 2008

Who would want an A9home PDA?
24th Apr 2008

RISC OS 6.10 available to Select subscribers
24th Apr 2008

Gallery photo


From: Col1's album

Older news
Animation and typing applications really released
24th Apr 2008

Wakefield 2008 show preview
22nd Apr 2008

R-Comp unveils new PDF authoring package
22nd Apr 2008

NetSurf bags GBP10K investment from Google
21st Apr 2008

Apple Mac VirtualRiscPC leaves beta
20th Apr 2008

Blu-ray disc burn breakthrough
14th Apr 2008

PDF import support for ArtWorks
13th Apr 2008

Wakefield 2008 show theatre line-up revealed
13th Apr 2008

Animation software collection falls into R-Comp's hands
9th Apr 2008

Features
A9home: two years on
4th Dec 2007

A9home DIY laptop: first pictures
1st Dec 2007

Software hosted by Drobe: Your guide
5th Nov 2007

 

Top | Design and concept © Fudgecake Design, 1999 - 2001. Content © The Drobe Team, 1999 - 2008. 
Click here for more information and terms and conditions.