Getting Started with OpenGL

We will be using the OpenGL and GLUT libraries in this class. The OpenGL Primer discusses OpenGL and GLUT.

This page is meant to help those who aren't exactly sure how to setup OpenGL/GLUT on their own. For those of you who do know how, feel free to download GLUT for yourself and compile them. Just make sure that when you hand in your assignments it runs on either the Windows or Linux (lab4) machines found in the CADE lab.

Online documentation for GLUT

There is a zip file for Windows/Linux/OSX. It contains a good starting point for the class. You can get it here

Windows Lab (WEB 130)

These are the instructions on how to get the sample code running under the Windows XP Machines found in the Windows CADE Lab (WEB 210). Things may be slightly different if running on other Windows machines (although it SHOULD work fine).

Double click on the solution "getting_started.sln" which should start up Visual Studio 2005. Once VS2005 is open there should be a project "getting_started." Inside this project under "Source Code" there is a "main.cpp" which is the source code you'll be working with. Double click on it and it should bring a new window and show the code.
Now you should be able to Build (F7) and run (F5) your project.

Linux Lab (WEB 224/226)

NOTE: These instructions will only work on the lab4 (ie. 32 bit) machines. These machines are located near the doors labeled WEB 226, they should be linux machines running CentOS (NOT the Solaris machines). lab1 and lab2 are 64 bit machines which do not have OpenGL acceleration.