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SDL vs GLUt vs GLFW vs Native

Started by qwertyuiop23 Apr 18, 2007 at 4:17 AM 2 replies 21.9k views
Original Post
qwertyuiop23
qwertyuiop23
Hi there, I am new to OpenGL. I know a little bit not much of C++ but not a lot of OpenGL but I want to program in it and I want to do it in DEV C++. From what I can gather and what I have experimented I found this information: Pros cons for each different way of doing it: GLUT: Pros Easy to learn Not a lot of coding to make things Cons Not very powerful Not a lot of game making functions GLFW: Pros Not as easy as glut but still easy Not a lot of code to make things Pretty versatile Cons Not a lot of help or tutorials SDL: Pros A lot of help Pretty powerful Not much about it with Dev C++ Cons A heck of a lot of coding for little progress Confusing coding Not already implemented with OpenGL (from what I can gather) Native OpenGL: Pros Lots of help Powerful Can do many things Cons Lots of coding Setting up lots of things to do one little thing OK that’s what I came up with. If you can help me out by deciding which one is the best all round and point me to some tutorials using DEV C++ in that OpenGL programming area I would be grateful Cheers QWERTYUIOP23
GamerSg
GamerSg
If you want to make your code cross-platform and dont want to rewrite things like creating the window/GL context/handle input/etc.. for every platform, native is out.

GLUT is pretty much dead as it has not been in active development for a long time.

The remaining 2 choices are both good, for me i went the GLFW way.
tstrimp
tstrimp
I started with SDL and then moved to GLFW since I was only using the portions of SDL pertaining to opening a window and getting input and I didn't like how it did either. I'm quite happy with GLFW.
Simian Man
Simian Man
I agree that SDL and GLFW are far better than the other two options.

GLFW is more specifically geared for OpenGL development, so if it suits your needs, that's probably the better option.

SDL is more general, but has nice add-on libs for networking, loading many image formats, font rendering and more.

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