Google aims for easier 3D Web on Windows

From CNET News.com: Google announced a move Thursday that could broaden the appeal of a nascent 3D Web graphics technology called WebGL.

A year ago Mozilla and the Khronos Group announced WebGL, which gives Web programmers a way to use hardware-accelerated 3D graphics on their Web pages, and in December, the two issued a draft WebGL standard. One hurdle, though, is that WebGL uses the Khronos Group's OpenGL graphics interface standard, but not all video cards have OpenGL support.

Google hopes to sidestep this issue with a new open-source projet that translates the OpenGL commands into the related dialect more common on Windows computers, Microsoft's Direct3D. The project is called ANGLE, short for Almost Native Graphics Layer Engine, Henry Bridge, a Google product manager, said in a blog post Thursday.

Using OpenGL "isn't a problem on computers running OS X or Linux, where OpenGL is the primary 3D API [application programming interface] and therefore enjoys solid support. On Windows, however, most graphics-intensive apps use Microsoft Direct3D APIs instead of OpenGL, so OpenGL drivers are not always available. Unfortunately, this situation means that even if they have powerful graphics hardware, many Windows machines can't render WebGL content because they don't have the necessary OpenGL drivers installed," Bridge said. "ANGLE will allow Windows users to run WebGL content without having to find and install new drivers for their system."

News of the project isn't a total surprise. Mozilla representatives involved in WebGL mentioned the Direct3D tie-up as one approach to reaching the Windows world better.

View: Article @ Source Site