ParaView/ParaView And Mesa 3D: Difference between revisions
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For this discussion we will stick with Linux-based systems. | For this discussion we will stick with Linux-based systems. | ||
=When to use Mesa= | |||
Some of the use-cases when one would build ParaView with Mesa are: | Some of the use-cases when one would build ParaView with Mesa are: | ||
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# You are building on a machine that has X, but you does not have graphics hardware or you still want to use software emulation for various reasons. | # You are building on a machine that has X, but you does not have graphics hardware or you still want to use software emulation for various reasons. | ||
In case of (1) you'll have to build with OSMesa support. With newer versions of Mesa (>= 7.9), ParaView can be built with OSMesa only when the Qt GUI is disabled. Refer to [[# | In case of (1) you'll have to build with OSMesa support. With newer versions of Mesa (>= 7.9), ParaView can be built with OSMesa only when the Qt GUI is disabled. Refer to [[#ParaView with Offscreen Mesa]] | ||
In case of (2) | In case of (2) you can configure Mesa with X support. Unlike with OSMesa, in this configuration, one can build both the server-executables as well as the Qt client, and both will use Mesa for rendering. Refer to [[#ParaView with Mesa]]. | ||
=ParaView with Mesa= | |||
==Configuring Mesa== | |||
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=ParaView with Offscreen Mesa= | |||
Revision as of 18:09, 12 October 2011
ParaView requires OpenGL libraries for rendering. For machines with sophisticated graphics cards, the OpenGL libraries are typically provided by the device drivers for those cards. However, on certain machines such as supercomputers without specialized graphics hardware, one has to rely on software-based rendering alternatives such as Mesa. Mesa is an open-source implementation of the OpenGL specification.
Mesa can be configured to work within different environments ranging from software emulation to complete hardware acceleration when supported GPUs are present. This discussion only applies to software emulation.
For this discussion we will stick with Linux-based systems.
When to use Mesa
Some of the use-cases when one would build ParaView with Mesa are:
- You are building on a machine where X Window System is not available.
- You are building on a machine that has X, but you does not have graphics hardware or you still want to use software emulation for various reasons.
In case of (1) you'll have to build with OSMesa support. With newer versions of Mesa (>= 7.9), ParaView can be built with OSMesa only when the Qt GUI is disabled. Refer to #ParaView with Offscreen Mesa
In case of (2) you can configure Mesa with X support. Unlike with OSMesa, in this configuration, one can build both the server-executables as well as the Qt client, and both will use Mesa for rendering. Refer to #ParaView with Mesa.
