Hi guys welcome to my opengl series , i have recently developed an interest in graphics programming ,so i am crating this series to track my progress.
In this post we will just create a blank window, i am going to use glfw and glew as the opengl extension loader
STRUCTURE
first lets create our directories
mkdir bin obj include src
touch Makefile src/main.cpp
it should now look like this
myproject
|-obj
|-src
|-main.cpp
|-bin
|-include
Makefile
Creating a Window in OpenGL using GLFW and GLEW on Linux
Creating a window in OpenGL using GLFW and GLEW on Linux involves several steps. Here’s a step-by-step guide on how to do it:
Include the Necessary Libraries
You need to include the GLFW and GLEW libraries in your program. GLFW is used for creating windows and handling input, while GLEW is used for loading OpenGL functions.
#include <GLFW/glfw3.h> #include <GL/glew.h>
Initialize GLFW
Before you can create a window, you need to initialize GLFW. If initialization fails, you should terminate the program.
if (!glfwInit()) { fprintf(stderr, "Failed to initialize GLFW\n"); return -1; }
Set Window Hints
GLFW allows you to set various window hints before creating the window. For example, you can set the version of OpenGL you want to use.
glfwWindowHint(GLFW_CONTEXT_VERSION_MAJOR, 3); glfwWindowHint(GLFW_CONTEXT_VERSION_MINOR, 3); glfwWindowHint(GLFW_OPENGL_PROFILE, GLFW_OPENGL_CORE_PROFILE);
Create a Window
You can create a window using the glfwCreateWindow function. This function takes the width and height of the window, the title of the window, and two optional parameters for the monitor and the share. If the window or OpenGL context creation fails, NULL will be returned.
GLFWwindow* window = glfwCreateWindow(800, 600, "LearnOpenGL", NULL, NULL); if (window == NULL) { fprintf(stderr, "Failed to create GLFW window\n"); glfwTerminate(); return -1; }
Make the Context Current
After creating the window, you need to make the context of the window current. This is done using the glfwMakeContextCurrent function.
glfwMakeContextCurrent(window);
Initialize GLEW
After making the context current, you can initialize GLEW. This will load all the OpenGL functions.
glewExperimental = GL_TRUE; GLenum err = glewInit(); if (err != GLEW_OK) { fprintf(stderr, "Failed to initialize GLEW\n"); return -1; }
Main Loop
Finally, you can enter the main loop where you will render your graphics and handle user input. This loop continues until the user closes the window.
while (!glfwWindowShouldClose(window)) { // Render here glClear(GL_COLOR_BUFFER_BIT);
// Swap front and back buffers glfwSwapBuffers(window);
// Poll for and process events glfwPollEvents(); }
glfwTerminate(); return 0;
This is a basic example of creating a window in OpenGL using GLFW and GLEW on Linux. Depending on your needs, you might want to add more functionality, such as handling user input, rendering graphics, etc.