GLX, GLU and DRI
GLXLibrary
GLX 1.3 is used on Unix OpenGL implementation to manage interaction with the X Window System and to encode OpenGL onto the X protocol stream for remote rendering. It supports: pixel buffers for hardware accelerated offscreen rendering; read-only drawables for preprocessing of data in an offscreen window and direct video input; and FBConfigs, a more powerful and flexible interface for selecting frame buffer configurations underlying an OpenGL rendering window.
- GLX 1.3 Spec (pdf), (PostScript)
- GLX Protocol Presentation Slides (PostScript)
- GLX 1.3 Protocol Encoding Spec (PostScript)
- GLX 1.2 Spec (PostScript)
- A version of GLX 1.2 open source code is available for public licensing.
GLU Library
GLU is the OpenGL Utility Library. This is a set of functions
to create texture mipmaps from a base image, map coordinates between
screen and object space, and draw quadric surfaces and NURBS.
GLU 1.2 is the version of GLU that goes with OpenGL 1.1.
GLU 1.3 is available and includes new capabilities corresponding
to new OpenGL 1.2 features.
- GLU 1.3 Spec (pdf) (PostScript)
Direct Rendering Infrastructure (DRI)
In simple terms, the DRI enables hardware-accelerated 3D graphics on Linux. More specifically, it's a software architecture for coordinating the Linux kernel, X window system, 3D graphics hardware and an OpenGL-based rendering engine.
As of mid-2000 the DRI has been incorporated into XFree86 4.0 and several hardware device drivers have been developed.
When everything is installed and configured correctly, no special actions are needed to enable 3D rendering. Simply start the X server as usual. Applications linked with the DRI component, libGL will automatically be hardware accelerated. If 3D hardware is not installed, OpenGL-based applications will still run correctly using GLX and the software renderer in the server.