Re: GNow

[Bert Peers <rat@larian.com>]

Marcelo wrote:

> > >> *Do* use libraries. They make it much easier for you (you do not have to
> > >> reinvent all this code again),
> > Just a quick comment on this...using a library won't help you learn what is
> > going on
> > "under the covers".
> Well, I admit that it was the idea when we think do not use libraries.
> What do you think we should do?

Well somebody already mentioned that *not* using a library may not
always be possible if you want the program for general use (for instance,
booting int10 requires hardware access, better let a lib do that).  But
more importantly, DirectX is showing us another reason why libs are
better, and that's hardware acceleration.  You'll usually want bare metal
access for writing high speed stuff, which is usually graphics and sound,
but these are getting more and more accelerated, and if the lib can use that,
you get it for free.  Without a lib, you'll have to find a way to use the
acceleration features of every card you think is important, which actually
comes down to abstracting the drawing functions and then implement them
for every card, in other words, write your own lib, where your "without a lib"
version is really just the unaccelerated setup.

I know it's fun to write all the classic demo fx yourself and do a blitter,
a 3D texture rasterizer and all that.  But I did it once to get a grasp of it,
and will never do it again, which I decided when I saw my blitting routines
go 4 times faster when I used a few simple Glide calls instead of hardcore,
highly optimized, squeezed to the last m-op MMX P2 code...


..just a few cents...
Bert
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