Glax - ActiveX with Opengl

An ActiveX control implementing
OpenGL 1.1
(with parts of glut and glaux added)

What does it?

The control provides a straight wrapper of the OpenGL-Api intended for use with Visual Basic.

News

If have added examples that implement the GLPaperplane example as a standard VB project
and an OCX control.

You can download the source code here: paperplane.zip

Events

The control has only to important events:

OnInit
one time initialization code for the OpenGL context goes here

OnDraw
drawing code

The Opengl context is set up properly, when these events are fired.
Don't call these funtion directly; if you want to redraw the control
use the function Refresh

Data Types

OpenGL	Visual Basic
Glenum	Long
Glboolean	Byte
Glbyte	Byte
Glshort	Integer
Glint	Long
Glsizei	Long
Glubyte	=Byte
Glushort	=Integer
Gluint	=Long
Glfloat	Single
Glclampf	Single
Gldouble	Double
Glclampd	Double
Glvoid	=>Interface VoidPointer

Arrays

you can feed arrays of arbitrary dimension to the OpenGL function
but since VB stores multidimensional arrays in column order instead
of the column order in C you have to revert the order of indices if
you are translated youre code form VB to C

Additional Functions

SwapBuffers

Refresh
forces redraw of control

Properties

DoubleBuffered (true/false)
    This must be set before the control is initialized.
    In a VB program you will set it in the property editor
    or inside the Form Load procedure.

special things

We need a generic way to handle OpenGL function that take a void pointer
since there is no clean way to handle this in VB.
I have decided to create a new COM class called VoidPointer that can
only created by two funtions:

wglMakeVoidPointer(GLenum type, v1() As Variant)
This takes the data type along with an array of Variants with your data as arguments
Example:
    Dim dp as VoidPointer
    Set dp= GlaxCtl1.wglMakeVoidPointer _
        (GL_DOUBLE, myArrayofVariantdouble)

MakeVoidPointerFromPointer(GLenum type, datapointer as Long, data() as Variant)
This one is needed for callback functions returning a "naked" data pointer.
The function converts the data pointed into an array of variants data while returning
a VoidPointer for further use of the data.
Example:
    Dim pData as VoidPointer
    Set pData = Form1.GLaxCtl3.MakeVoidPointerFromPointer _
        (GL_DOUBLE, datapointer, data)

There is now a wrapper for auxDIBImageLoad() called DIBImageLoad() to load DIB images. The use is straightforward:
    Dim vp As VoidPointer
    Dim cx As Long, cy As Long ' image extent
    Set vp = .DIBImageLoad("your.bmp", cx, cy)
    .glPixelStorei GL_UNPACK_ALIGNMENT, 1
    .glDrawPixels cx, cy, GL_RGB, GL_UNSIGNED_BYTE, vp

known problems:

none (for now), but bug reports are welcome

Control and an example program (Visual Basic 6):

needs NT 4 (SP3 or higher) or Win95/98 with DCOM95/98 installed
this version uses the Microsoft OpenGL implementation
Download (if you have a previous version you should
uninstall the old control)

Source only:

needs glut.h
The VC6 project: Download

License Agreement:

This Software ("Glax-Control") is owned by Karl M. Syring. Karl M. Syring grants to the user a nonexclusive license to use this Software solely for User's own personal or internal business purposes. The user may not commercially distribute, sublicense, resell, or otherwise transfer for any consideration, or reproduce for any such purposes, the software or any modification or derivation thereof, either alone or in conjunction with any other product or program. Further, the user may not modify the Software, other than for User's own personal or internal business use.
THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED TO THE USER "AS IS." Karl M. Syring MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EITHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, WITH RESPECT TO THIS SOFTWARE AND/OR ASSOCIATED MATERIALS PROVIDED TO THE USER, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY WARRANTY OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE OR AGAINST INFRINGEMENT. Karl M. Syring DOES NOT WARRANT THAT THE FUNCTIONS CONTAINED IN THE SOFTWARE WILL MEET YOUR REQUIREMENTS, OR THAT THE OPERATION OF THE SOFTWARE WILL BE UNINTERRUPTED OR ERROR-FREE, OR THAT DEFECTS IN THE SOFTWARE WILL BE CORRECTED. FURTHERMORE, Karl M. Syring DOES NOT WARRANT OR MAKE ANY REPRESENTATIONS REGARDING THE USE OR THE RESULTS OF THE USE OF THE SOFTWARE OR ANY DOCUMENTATION PROVIDED HEREWITH IN TERMS OF THEIR CORRECTNESS, ACCURACY, RELIABILITY, OR OTHERWISE. NO ORAL OR WRITTEN INFORMATION OR ADVICE GIVEN BY Karl M. Syring OR A Karl M. Syring AUTHORIZED REPRESENTATIVE SHALL CREATE A WARRANTY OR IN ANY WAY INCREASE THE SCOPE OF THIS WARRANTY.

LIMITATION OF LIABILITY -- Karl M. Syring AND his LICENSORS ARE NOT LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIMS OR DAMAGES WHATSOEVER, INCLUDING PROPERTY DAMAGE, PERSONAL INJURY, INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY INFRINGEMENT, LOSS OF PROFITS, OR INTERRUPTION OF BUSINESS, OR FOR ANY SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES, HOWEVER CAUSED, WHETHER ARISING OUT OF BREACH OF WARRANTY, CONTRACT, TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE), STRICT LIABILITY, OR OTHERWISE.

Last change on 11/01/01 by K. M. Syring

An ActiveX control implementing OpenGL 1.1 (with parts of glut and glaux added)

An ActiveX control implementing
OpenGL 1.1
(with parts of glut and glaux added)