Microsoft controls the most popular operating system on planet earth, along with its associated APIs. If Microsoft decides that it wants to help one manufacturer more than another, the ramifications can obviously be immense.
If you're developing new graphics technology and Microsoft opts not to support your new features in their next API, the effect would be chilling on your product's competitiveness. This is something that's always in the back of the mind of a hardware developer as they decide how vocal they wish to be about Direct3D and its shortcomings.
OpenGL's history on the PC has been somewhat rocky and turbulent. As recently as four years ago many 3D accelerator manufacturers would not publicly admit they were supporting OpenGL because of fear of reprisal from Microsoft.
After GLQuake and other OpenGL game titles began shipping, 3D accelerator manufacturers saw the business sense in supporting OpenGL, and Microsoft was not in a position anymore to stop them -- although some manufacturers were still very edgy about putting too much support into OpenGL. At least they could post OGL drivers on their driver support Web pages without too much fear.
By mid-late 1998, there was a serious leadership vacuum in the OpenGL space. The 3D accelerator vendors didn't have strong leadership anymore because SGI was busy dealing with its own set of issues. This caused a very fractured OpenGL strategy to develop on the PC -- basically, OpenGL was considered a necessary API for support, but each vendor sort of went their own way when it came to extensions, stability, and optimization.
By early 1999, those 3D chip vendors that were not NVidia realized they were at a very significant disadvantage when it came to API support under Windows. 3Dfx had Glide, sure, but Glide was already singing its swan song as developers started moving to more standardized APIs. At this point, NVidia also began exposing strong OpenGL extensions so that developers could begin using their cool features before DX8 shipped. This has set a precedent of exposing pretty core features of a chip set in OpenGL before DirectX N+1 ships. Hopefully other vendors -- specifically ATI and 3Dfx -- will get their respective acts together and start shipping chips and drivers competitive with NVidia's.
The key now is to watch how multiple vendors resolve their disparate extensions without a single strong leader that everyone trusts. If they can't manage to come up with a set of universal extensions and a consistent, predictable path to rolling these capabilities into future OpenGL base specifications, then things could get very touch and go until a strong leader emerges in the OpenGL space.
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Microsoft controls the most popular operating system on planet earth, along with its associated APIs. If Microsoft decides that it wants to help one manufacturer more than another, the ramifications can obviously be immense.
If you're developing new graphics technology and Microsoft opts not to support your new features in their next API, the effect would be chilling on your product's competitiveness. This is something that's always in the back of the mind of a hardware developer as they decide how vocal they wish to be about Direct3D and its shortcomings.
Brian Hook
OpenGL's history on the PC has been somewhat rocky and turbulent. As recently as four years ago many 3D accelerator manufacturers would not publicly admit they were supporting OpenGL because of fear of reprisal from Microsoft.
After GLQuake and other OpenGL game titles began shipping, 3D accelerator manufacturers saw the business sense in supporting OpenGL, and Microsoft was not in a position anymore to stop them -- although some manufacturers were still very edgy about putting too much support into OpenGL. At least they could post OGL drivers on their driver support Web pages without too much fear.
By mid-late 1998, there was a serious leadership vacuum in the OpenGL space. The 3D accelerator vendors didn't have strong leadership anymore because SGI was busy dealing with its own set of issues. This caused a very fractured OpenGL strategy to develop on the PC -- basically, OpenGL was considered a necessary API for support, but each vendor sort of went their own way when it came to extensions, stability, and optimization.
By early 1999, those 3D chip vendors that were not NVidia realized they were at a very significant disadvantage when it came to API support under Windows. 3Dfx had Glide, sure, but Glide was already singing its swan song as developers started moving to more standardized APIs. At this point, NVidia also began exposing strong OpenGL extensions so that developers could begin using their cool features before DX8 shipped. This has set a precedent of exposing pretty core features of a chip set in OpenGL before DirectX N+1 ships. Hopefully other vendors -- specifically ATI and 3Dfx -- will get their respective acts together and start shipping chips and drivers competitive with NVidia's.
The key now is to watch how multiple vendors resolve their disparate extensions without a single strong leader that everyone trusts. If they can't manage to come up with a set of universal extensions and a consistent, predictable path to rolling these capabilities into future OpenGL base specifications, then things could get very touch and go until a strong leader emerges in the OpenGL space.
Brian Hook