Good day everyone. I’ve done some openGL progamming in the past at school and I want to get into it again. However, being a normal human being I don’t have an SGI box. All I’ve got is your standard windows box and I have no idea which developement kit to use. I want to create win32 applications so I don’t have to deal with the console all the time. Does anybody have any suggestions as to which dev-kit I should use?
There are many Enviroments you can use, for example Microsoft Visual C++, Borland C Builder, Delphi etc. . I don’t know what you prefer ???
I think Visual C++ is the best Enviroment for staring with Win32 Stuff…
In my opinion the best compiler ships with Visual C++ (you may also plug in Intel’s compiler into this environment, which is even better), while Inprise C++ Builder 5 provides the best IDE.
My preference is Metrowerks Codewarrior. Its compatible with all of the vis c code, but with an IDE (and debugger) on par with Borland. Same IDE for mac, windows and linux is also very convenient.
Joe
BTW: Inprise is Borland again 
-Lev
If you want something free, DJGPP is a good Windows port of the GNU C/C++ compiler. RHIDE is a good IDE designed to work with it. However, I’ve never seen a free IDE on par with Visual C++.
Owlet
There is no real need for a vis environment with opengl (ok it depends what you are doing but for now) so just use the free command line compilers, or something like codewarrior. At least with command line you will understande more. Codewarrior is good for cross platform compiles etc.
Well, I’ve worked with Code Warrior before but for Java (hehe) and it seems to work decently well for that but I don’t feel that I should go pay for it for now. Maybe if I write a playstation game or something…
I’ve tried playing with Bloodshed Dev-C++ and that seems OK for now since it comes with a win32 openGL template. But all of this win32 stuff is a bit confusing. I just don’t understand it right now but I think I’ll catch on.
Now I’ve got another question (I might post a new topic about this though): does C# support openGL and, if so, has anybody tried using it?
Nobody really Nobody want to use C#.
why not?
C# has its uses, but OpenGL isn’t one of them. If you really want to use OpenGL in C#, there is a library someone wrote that you can use. (Sorry, don’t have a URL to it offhand, do a Google search and you should be able to find it, if you really want, though.)
Personally, I like the IDE for VC++. The Class View is just SO nice for jumping around in code.
Yeah, i really agree. One can argue which is the best compiler, but VC++/MSDEV has the best ide of all i tried yet. Also, you can plug different compilers into it if you really want.
I will say one thing on this subject. It all depends on your personal preferences BUT if you want your skills to be worth something when you finish playing and start working, use Visual C++. It will get you some brownie points on your resume over Borland or others.
For C/C++ compiler on win32 try mingw at www.mingw.org,for text editor with color syntax highlight try SciTE at www.scintilla.org.
If you don’t want to pay alot for your compiler/IDE, check out the compiler/editor/IDE overview at http://hem.passagen.se/opengl/getstarted (compiler section). And if you don’t understand Win32 stuff (which is understandable), check out GLFW , which does alot of the boring stuff for you.
I’ve had great luck with my Watcom compiler. Its pretty old, though. Are they still around? Suprised no one mentioned them.
I cheat, though and use Visual C++ to make my resources, then compile them in with Watcom.