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Depreciated opengl functions and techniques

Started by ajp29 May 31, 2010 at 7:45 PM 2 replies 1.7k views

Original Post

May 31, 2010 at 7:45 PM

Hello,
After posting on the opengl forums and talking about depreciated features and functions of opengl 3 and up, I came to one simple conclusion. The conclusion is I still don't know the full extent of depreciated features in software development. This is why I am posting this in the for beginners sections, because this is a beginner question about understanding software. The long and the short of it is, what does depreciated mean?

The longer version is this. Lets say I pick up the opengl blue book(The super bible) and start learning from there. Will my code still work in the future or will It all have to be rewritten? Is that what depreciated means? That the code will eventually stop being supported? This is my main concern. I have friends who work on linux and who work with opengl and I want to work with them on it. The problem is I am new to 3d (Not math ) as well as GL and wanted to know the right way of doing things and the correct practices.

Another question I have is a slightly trickier one. I heard that one of the hardest things to do in 3d. I read about the basics of this on a gamedev link on the basics of spherical collision detection. My question is does anyone have any recommendations if my assumptions on depreciated code is off on a book that also focuses on game development?

thanks
ajp29

Side note. I am new to some terms and i meant "deprecated", not "depreciated". Thanks Dragon88 for that note.

[Edited by - ajp29 on May 31, 2010 8:56:00 PM]

Dragon88

May 31, 2010 at 7:54 PM

First off, I'm assuming you mean "deprecated", not "depreciated". Secondly, in general the features that were deprecated it OGL3 were immediate mode and the fixed-function pipeline. This reflects modern game development, and also helps guide you in the direction of writing optimized code. Yes, it is true that in theory, these deprecated features could cease to be supported in future versions of OGL.

So, pretty much what it boils down to, is that you shouldn't use immediate mode (glBegin, glEnd, glVertex, etc). You should be using vertex arrays and the shader pipeline (pixel shaders and vertex shaders). As long as whatever you learn covers those topics, you should be on a good start.

karwosts

May 31, 2010 at 8:10 PM

Quote:

Is that what depreciated means? That the code will eventually stop being supported?

In theory yes that is true. In reality I would guess that these old functions are still going to be around for a long time, given the huge amount of corporate software that is written against them.

I would suggest that you are worrying too much. Just get out there and start learning anything you can. Draw triangles, draw spinning cubes, make a tetris game, everything you learn will still grow your base of knowledge even if the function calls you use aren't the most up to date. You'll still be building your understanding of 3D graphics theory, which is a lot more important than the API calls you use to do it.

Now you can't be complacent either, and as you learn strive to replace deprecated versions of your software with the latest techniques, because these are superior methods. But the underlying theory is still the same.

Just don't let uncertainty paralyze you into doing nothing.

Quote:

I heard that one of the hardest things to do in 3d.

I wouldn't give much weight to this. It is a broad field and there is lots to learn just like any other field, but if you have a decent grasp on mathematics it isn't that bad. Personally I find designing my game engine coherently to be a lot harder than just the 3d stuff, but that's just me.

HuntsMan

May 31, 2010 at 8:44 PM

In OpenGL, a deprecated feature means "there's a new faster, more flexible way of doing the same in modern GL versions".

Thus, learning the modern ways is a way to avoid deprecated features.

But if it's for learning, using deprecated features is fine, they won't stop working for at least 10 - 15 years.

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