Running Qt/KDE Atop An OpenGL Stack

[phoronix]

Phoronix: Running Qt/KDE Atop An OpenGL Stack

Zack Rusin, the well-known X.Org and KDE hacker, has written a new blog post concerning the Qt tool-kit and the different options that are available when it comes to rendering graphics. Qt currently can target a pure CPU raster engine, using X11 with the X Render extension for providing some GPU-assisted acceleration, or using an OpenGL engine...

http://www.phoronix.com/vr.php?view=NzQ1NA

[wswartzendruber]

Yeah now that DRI2 is finally here.

[spykes]

the quicker we get the rendering stack to work on top of OpenGL the better off we'll be

Isn't what's actually doing the Clutter toolkit ?
Anyway, it's good to see that everybody is going in this direction.
Graphic cards are all designed for 3D rendering those days, so it makes sense to use 3D API even to draw 2D UI.

[thefirstm]

Something that nobody ever mentioned: using the OpenGL stack, it evidently turns of subpixel text rendering.

[BlackStar]

Something that nobody ever mentioned: using the OpenGL stack, it evidently turns of subpixel text rendering.

There's no technical reason to turn off subpixel AA for text when using OpenGL. I have coded a cross-platform OpenGL text engine that looks 100% identical to the underlying font renderer (kerning, subpixel AA).

That said, there are many ways to render text using OpenGL, each with different tradeoffs between speed, memory consumption and quality. My guess is that a) this is a plain old bug (note: Qt4 had completely broken subpixel AA until version 4.5) or b) Qt opts to reduce quality in favor of memory consumption (which is flat-out wrong, IMO).

[thefirstm]

I didn't think it was impossible to do subpixel with OpenGL, I was just saying that it didn't, and that keeps me from using the OGL mode.

[BlackStar]

I didn't think it was impossible to do subpixel with OpenGL, I was just saying that it didn't, and that keeps me from using the OGL mode.

Absolutely agreed - the same thing that's stopping you from using Qt/OGL now, stopped me from using any Qt4 application prior to Qt4.5.

Text rendering is the single most important aspect of any user interface. I wish Qt developers would understand that.

[nanonyme]

Absolutely agreed - the same thing that's stopping you from using Qt/OGL now, stopped me from using any Qt4 application prior to Qt4.5.

Text rendering is the single most important aspect of any user interface. I wish Qt developers would understand that.

Yeah, assuming you're dealing with humans instead of apes who can't read anyway. :3

[energyman]

I didn't think it was impossible to do subpixel with OpenGL, I was just saying that it didn't, and that keeps me from using the OGL mode.

really? I started kwin with opengl and konqueror - and the fonts looked like the rest.
Ah, wait, I don't use subpixel hinting, because I don't like it.

[RealNC]

really? I started kwin with opengl and konqueror - and the fonts looked like the rest.
Ah, wait, I don't use subpixel hinting, because I don't like it.

Then what's your point? He said OpenGL currently breaks subpixel rendering. You don't use subpixel rendering. What's the point of your post?