Uniform confusion

[Vexator]

I use the folowing code to query all active uniforms in a program:

int activeUniforms;
char uniformName[256];
 
// get number of active uniforms
glGetProgramiv( program->id, GL_ACTIVE_UNIFORMS, &activeUniforms );
 
// save names, sizes and locations of all uniforms
for( uint index = 0; index < activeUniforms; index++ )
{
	int type, location;
 
	// get uniform's name and data type at given index
	glGetActiveUniformName(	program->id, index, 256, 0, uniformName );
	glGetActiveUniformsiv( program->id, 1, &amp;index, GL_UNIFORM_TYPE, &amp;type );
 
	// get uniform's location
	location = glGetUniformLocation( program->id, uniformName );
 
	// store type size and location of uniform
	program->uniforms[uniformName].first = datatypeSizes[type];
	program->uniforms[uniformName].second = location;
}

This enumerates all active uniforms including those which a part of a uniform block. For those, however, a location of -1 is returned. Why? If a uniform is active, it has a location, even if it's part of a uniform block, doesn't it?

For example, for this program:

vs:
 
#version 150 core
 
layout(location=0) in vec4 in_vertexPos;
 
layout(std140) uniform Projection
{
	mat4 perspective;
	mat4 orthographic;
} projection;
 
void main()
{
	gl_Position = projection.orthographic*vec4(in_vertexPos.xyz, 1.0);
}
 
fs:
 
#version 150 core
 
out vec4 out_Color;
 
uniform vec4 color;
uniform vec4 color2;
 
void main()
{
	out_Color = color*color2;
}

these uniforms are listed:

Active uniforms
---------------
Uniform: 'projection.orthographic' (size: 64, location: -1)
Uniform: 'color' (size: 16, location: 0)
Uniform: 'color2' (size: 16, location: 1)
Uniform: 'projection.perspective' (size: 64, location: -1)

Does that make sense?

EDIT: Is glGetActiveUniformsiv even part of the core yet? Can't find it in either the 3.3 nor the 4.1 specs..?!

[l_belev]

uniforms in named blocks don't have locations, glGetUniformLocation returns -1 for them. This is so by the specification. Instead for them you can get the offset from the block start with glGetActiveUniformsiv with pname of GL_UNIFORM_OFFSET

You better ask such questions in the "begginers" forum section,
or even better just read the specification yourself

[Dan Bartlett]

glGetActiveUniformsiv is part of the GL_ARB_uniform_buffer_object extension + core OpenGL from version 3.1.

If you're searching the spec for it, remember to remove the "gl" from the start, just search for "GetActiveUniformsiv"