[squeak-dev] [ANN] Croquet OpenGL on Squeaksource (Re: Trying to load ALienOpenGL into 4.1 alpha...)

Ross Boylan ross at biostat.ucsf.edu
Mon Mar 29 23:47:21 UTC 2010


On Mon, 2010-03-22 at 23:04 -0700, Andreas Raab wrote:
> On 3/22/2010 7:27 PM, Lawson English wrote:
> > Croquet OpenGL is dependent on all sorts of things. Have you managed to
> > get Croquet working in a modernish version of Squeak/Pharo?
> 
> (you will need an updated 4.1 trunk image - I've promoted 
> Form>>flipVertically to core in the process of making this package)
> 
>  From http://www.squeaksource.com/CroquetGL
> 
> The OpenGL interface from Croquet for consumption in other contexts. 
> Supports OpenGL 1.4 plus extensions.
> 
> To install, first load the FFI via:
> 
> (Installer repository: 'http://source.squeak.org/FFI')
> 	install: 'FFI-Pools';
> 	install: 'FFI-Kernel';
> 	install: 'FFI-Tests'.
> 
> then load CroquetGL:
> 
> (Installer repository: 'http://www.squeaksource.com/CroquetGL')
> 	install: '3DTransform';
> 	install: 'OpenGL-Pools';
> 	install: 'OpenGL-Core'.
> 
> When everything has loaded, try the example:
> 
> 	OpenGL example.
> 
> Important Windows Note:
> 
> In order to use Croquet on Windows, you must make sure your VM is set to 
> support OpenGL instead of D3D by default. To do this, press F2 or go to 
> the system menu, into the "Display and Sound" section and ensure the 
> preference "Use OpenGL (instead of D3D" is ENABLED.
> 
> Cheers,
>    - Andreas
> 
I have a couple of questions about this.

First, I thought a lot of the OGL in squeak code required a special vm
to understand a C style syntax for function calls.  So how can this
work?  Possibilities:
  1) 4.1 requires a new VM, and that VM has the feature enabled
  2) existing squeak VM's support it
  3) Croquet code uses that syntax, but it's not in the image.  ogl
calls should be conventional smalltalk style.
  4) ....?

Second, does the later message

> Yeah, I was wondering why it's so much slower in trunk than in our 
> internal images or Croquet. First I thought it's the JIT but then I 
> looked at a profile and found EventSensor>>wait2ms called from
> several 
> places in EventSensor and indirectly via Sensor anyButtonPressed .
imply that performance will be painful?

I'm interested in this partly because Croquet is using lots of CPU when
I try it.  Since I don't need shared spaces, I was hoping something
lighter weight would avoid the problem.  And at least it has a VM with a
known build procedure.

Thanks.
Ross Boylan




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