The GDL API is used for example on intel ce4100 (aka Sodaville) based
systems as a way to allocate memory that can be composited using the
platforms overlay hardware. This updates the Cogl EGL winsys and the
support in Clutter so we can continue to support these platforms.
So that we can dynamically select what winsys backend to use at runtime
we need to have some indirection to how code accesses the winsys instead
of simply calling _cogl_winsys* functions that would collide if we
wanted to compile more than one backend into Cogl.
This migrates all the GLX window system code down from the Clutter
backend code into a Cogl winsys. Moving OpenGL window system binding
code down from Clutter into Cogl is the biggest blocker to having Cogl
become a standalone 3D graphics library, so this is an important step in
that direction.
As part of the process of splitting Cogl out as a standalone graphics
API we need to introduce some API concepts that will allow us to
initialize a new CoglContext when Clutter isn't there to handle that for
us...
The new objects roughly in the order that they are (optionally) involved
in constructing a context are: CoglRenderer, CoglOnscreenTemplate,
CoglSwapChain and CoglDisplay.
Conceptually a CoglRenderer represents a means for rendering. Cogl
supports rendering via OpenGL or OpenGL ES 1/2.0 and those APIs are
accessed through a number of different windowing APIs such as GLX, EGL,
SDL or WGL and more. Potentially in the future Cogl could render using
D3D or even by using libdrm and directly banging the hardware. All these
choices are wrapped up in the configuration of a CoglRenderer.
Conceptually a CoglDisplay represents a display pipeline for a renderer.
Although Cogl doesn't aim to provide a detailed abstraction of display
hardware, on some platforms we can give control over multiple display
planes (On TV platforms for instance video content may be on one plane
and 3D would be on another so a CoglDisplay lets you select the plane
up-front.)
Another aspect of CoglDisplay is that it lets us negotiate a display
pipeline that best supports the type of CoglOnscreen framebuffers we are
planning to create. For instance if you want transparent CoglOnscreen
framebuffers then we have to be sure the display pipeline wont discard
the alpha component of your framebuffers. Or if you want to use
double/tripple buffering that requires support from the display
pipeline.
CoglOnscreenTemplate and CoglSwapChain are how we describe our default
CoglOnscreen framebuffer configuration which can affect the
configuration of the display pipeline.
The default/simple way we expect most CoglContexts to be constructed
will be via something like:
if (!cogl_context_new (NULL, &error))
g_error ("Failed to construct a CoglContext: %s", error->message);
Where that NULL is for an optional "display" parameter and NULL says to
Cogl "please just try to do something sensible".
If you want some more control though you can manually construct a
CoglDisplay something like:
display = cogl_display_new (NULL, NULL);
cogl_gdl_display_set_plane (display, plane);
if (!cogl_display_setup (display, &error))
g_error ("Failed to setup a CoglDisplay: %s", error->message);
And in a similar fashion to cogl_context_new() you can optionally pass
a NULL "renderer" and/or a NULL "onscreen template" so Cogl will try to
just do something sensible.
If you need to change the CoglOnscreen defaults you can provide a
template something like:
chain = cogl_swap_chain_new ();
cogl_swap_chain_set_has_alpha (chain, TRUE);
cogl_swap_chain_set_length (chain, 3);
onscreen_template = cogl_onscreen_template_new (chain);
cogl_onscreen_template_set_pixel_format (onscreen_template,
COGL_PIXEL_FORMAT_RGB565);
display = cogl_display_new (NULL, onscreen_template);
if (!cogl_display_setup (display, &error))
g_error ("Failed to setup a CoglDisplay: %s", error->message);
