OpenGL on your mobile phone

Oooh, imagine the possibilities...

Silicon Graphics (SGI) and a group of other major players in the computer graphics industry have released the latest specification for the OpenGL application programming interface, OpenGL 1.4.

SGI and Nokia also said that they are planning to work on a version of OpenGL for mobile phones, handheld computers and other portable devices. For gaming, OpenGL has been largely superseded with the Windows operating system by Microsoft's DirectX. However, OpenGL is widely used with other operating systems, such as Mac OS X, Linux and Unix. In addition, a number of best-selling 3D games, such as "Doom" and "Quake," rely on OpenGL.

SGI also said that it and Nokia have agreed to develop a 3D standard based on OpenGL for all embedded mobile devices. The standard will tie into a similar project from Khronos Group, and will complement a mobile Java 3D standard currently in development.

However...The OpenGL specification may run the risk of being thrown off course by Microsoft patent claims. At the ARB's most recent meeting, Microsoft said it believed it had patents covering vertex programming and a technology called fragment shading.

News source: ZDNet