How to detect when driver is uninstalled/upgraded?
Hi all,
I tried to search the FAQ and forum before posting but didn't find much useful info. I have a openGL application
which runs fine, but some users claim when uninstalling or upgrading the graphic driver the app turns black and
sometimes crash.
So what does the driver do when uninstalling/upgrading? How can I detect such things in my app?
Thanks for your time! A quick answer may be sufficient to fix my problems.
glGetString (http://www.opengl.org/sdk/docs/man/x...lGetString.xml) can give you information about the renderer, depending on the implementation, this can contain the drivers version number (e.g. NVidia).
If the driver got uninstalled, there is no OpenGL implementation anymore (or just a 1.2 fallback in windows), so no wonder an OpenGL App will not work anymore. If your app has problems with different driver versions, get the driver infos from your users and check if theres a driver bug or a bug in your app related to e.g. undefined behavior (which is ok to change from driver to driver of course).
Thank you.Originally Posted by menzel
Do you suggest I should keep testing glGetString from time to time when my app is running and stop relying on OpenGL when it's being uninstalled/upgraded? Is there any event that I can use, or does the driver installer just brutally destroy everything(textures, fbos etc) without letting my app know?
You can directly check which OpenGL version is supported and what extensions are there instead of relying on a specific driver/version.
If your user uninstalls the driver, you can't do anything against it. Also if the user removes his graphicscard, you can't stop him...
