OpenGL是一种APl，不是语言 毕业论文外文翻译.docVIP

英文原文： OpenGL: An API, Not a Language For the most part, OpenGL is not a programming language; it is an application programming interface (API). Whenever we say that a program is OpenGL-based or an OpenGL application, we mean that it was written in some programming language(such as C or C++) that makes calls to one or more of the OpenGL libraries. We are not saying that the program uses OpenGL exclusively to do drawing. It might combine the best features of two different graphics packages. Or it might use OpenGL for only a few specific tasks and environment-specific graphics (such as the Windows GDI) for others. The only exception to this rule of thumb is, of course, the OpenGL Shading Language, which is covered in Part II. As an API, the OpenGL library follows the C calling convention. As it turns out, this choice of calling convention makes it possible to easily call OpenGL directly from most other languages as well. In this book, the sample programs are written in C++. C++ programs can easily access C functions and APIs in the same manner as C, with only some minor considerations. C++ is the modern language of choice for most performanceminded applications. Very basic C++ classes can dramatically simplify most programming tasks as well. We promise to keep the object usage to a minimum, no STL/Template/Operator Overloaded/Meta blah blah厀e promise! Other programming languages梥uch as Visual Basic梩hat can call functions in C libraries can also make use of OpenGL, and OpenGL bindings are available for many other programming languages. Using OpenGL from these other languages is, however, outside the scope of this book and can be somewhat tedious to explain. To keep things simple and easily portable, we抣l stick with C++ for our examples. Standard Libraries and Headers Although OpenGL is a “standard” programming library, this library has many implementations and versions. On Microsoft Windows, for example, the actual Microsoft software implementation is in