Getting started with openGL on Linux and Windows

Compiled by Vinod Pathangay ( vinod AT cse DOT iitm DOT ernet DOT in )
Updated by Amit Padhy (padhy AT cse DOT iitm DOT ac DOT in )

OpenGL (GLUT) on Linux (Fedora core 4)

Starting FC4 you just need to install freeglut .

OpenGL (GLUT) on Linux (Fedora core 1)

Installation

Check if the following rpms are installed

1. XFree86-Mesa-libGL-4.3.0-42 download
2. XFree86-Mesa-libGLU-4.3.0-42 download
3. glut-3.7-8 download
4. glut-devel-3.7-8 download

You can check this using the commands
rpm -qa | grep glut
rpm -qa | grep GL

If you do not have the above packages installed, then download and install using the following command as root (replace fileName.rpm with each of the above downloaded files)
rpm -ivh fileName.rpm

Once you have the above RPMs and their dependencies installed then you are ready to compile and run OpenGL programs.

OpenGL (GLUT) on Linux (Ubuntu)

Installation

Install the following packages from the ubuntu repository:
1. freeglut3-dev
2. mesa-common-dev

sudo apt-get install freeglut3 freeglut3-dev mesa-common-dev

Check your /usr/include/GL folder to verify the installation of the openGL headers that you intend to use.

Compiling and Linking

You will have to use the -lglut linker option with gcc/g++ to compile a program with glut library.
For example, to compile the program cube.c that uses GLUT type, use
gcc -o cube cube.c -lglut -lGLU
to get the binary executable cube.

If you are not using GLUT and want to use the lower level libraries then use -lGL -lGLU also in the linker options.

OpenGL (GLUT) on Windows

Installation

You will need the following files for developing OpenGL programs

opengl32.lib
glu32.lib
gl.h
glu.h

These are usually provided by the manufacturer of your display adapter. The following files will also be needed for using GLUT

glut32.dll
glut32.lib
glut.h
Download GLUT. Unzip and copy glut32.dll to C:\Windows\system32

Compiling and Linking using MS Visual Studio

For GLUT programs
1. Start Visual C++ and create a new empty project of type Win32 Console Application.
2. Add a GLUT program to the project like cube.c .
3. Goto Projects, Settings, C++ tab, select Category - Preprocessor. In the additional include directory box give the path where GL/glut.h is present.
4. Goto Projects, Settings, Link tab, select Category - Input. In additional library path give the location of glut32.lib
Some examples
dot plot
single torus
complex scene .



Sample Codes: Click here to Download