The
Lightweight Java Game Library (
LWJGL) is an
open sourceOpen source is an approach to the design, development, and distribution of software, offering practical accessibility to a software's source code. Some consider open source as one of various possible design approaches, while others consider it a critical strategic element of their operations...
JavaJava is a programming language originally developed by James Gosling at Sun Microsystems and released in 1995 as a core component of Sun Microsystems' Java platform. The language derives much of its syntax from C and C++ but has a simpler object model and fewer low-level facilities...
software library for computer game developers.
LWJGL exposes high performance
cross-platformIn computing, cross-platform is a term used to refer to computer software or computing methods and concepts that are implemented and inter-operate on multiple computer platforms...
librariesIn computer science, a library is a collection of subroutines or classes used to develop software. Libraries contain code and data that provide services to independent programs. This allows the sharing and changing of code and data in a modular fashion. Some executables are both standalone programs...
commonly used in developing software games and multimedia titles. It exposes
OpenGLOpenGL is a standard specification defining a cross-language, cross-platform API for writing applications that produce 2D and 3D computer graphics. The interface consists of over 250 different function calls which can be used to draw complex three-dimensional scenes from simple primitives. OpenGL...
(Open Graphics Library),
OpenALOpenAL is a free software cross-platform audio API. It is designed for efficient rendering of multichannel three dimensional positional audio. Its API style and conventions deliberately resemble that of OpenGL.- History :...
(Open Audio Library) and allows access to controllers such as gamepads, steering wheels and joysticks in a platform-neutral way.
The primary goal of the project is to provide a technology which allows Java developers to get access to resources that are otherwise unavailable or poorly implemented on the existing Java platform.
The
Lightweight Java Game Library (
LWJGL) is an
open sourceOpen source is an approach to the design, development, and distribution of software, offering practical accessibility to a software's source code. Some consider open source as one of various possible design approaches, while others consider it a critical strategic element of their operations...
JavaJava is a programming language originally developed by James Gosling at Sun Microsystems and released in 1995 as a core component of Sun Microsystems' Java platform. The language derives much of its syntax from C and C++ but has a simpler object model and fewer low-level facilities...
software library for computer game developers.
LWJGL exposes high performance
cross-platformIn computing, cross-platform is a term used to refer to computer software or computing methods and concepts that are implemented and inter-operate on multiple computer platforms...
librariesIn computer science, a library is a collection of subroutines or classes used to develop software. Libraries contain code and data that provide services to independent programs. This allows the sharing and changing of code and data in a modular fashion. Some executables are both standalone programs...
commonly used in developing software games and multimedia titles. It exposes
OpenGLOpenGL is a standard specification defining a cross-language, cross-platform API for writing applications that produce 2D and 3D computer graphics. The interface consists of over 250 different function calls which can be used to draw complex three-dimensional scenes from simple primitives. OpenGL...
(Open Graphics Library),
OpenALOpenAL is a free software cross-platform audio API. It is designed for efficient rendering of multichannel three dimensional positional audio. Its API style and conventions deliberately resemble that of OpenGL.- History :...
(Open Audio Library) and allows access to controllers such as gamepads, steering wheels and joysticks in a platform-neutral way.
The primary goal of the project is to provide a technology which allows Java developers to get access to resources that are otherwise unavailable or poorly implemented on the existing Java platform. The main philosophy is to expose underlying technology as a thin wrapper, thus creating a simple
APIAn application programming interface is an interface in computer science that defines the ways by which an application program may request services from libraries and/or operating systems. An API determines the vocabulary and calling conventions the programmer should employ to use the services...
. It has been the foundation of other complete game libraries and
game engineA game engine is a software system designed for the creation and development of video games. There are many game engines that are designed to work on video game consoles and desktop operating systems such as Microsoft Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X...
s such as the
jMonkey EnginejMonkey Engine is a high-performance 3D game engine, written entirely in Java. OpenGL is supported via LWJGL, with JOGL support in development. For sound, OpenAL is supported. Input via the keyboard, mouse, and other controllers is also supported.jME is a community-driven open source project...
or
Jake2Jake2 is a Java port of the GPL release of the Quake II game engine.-History:The 0.9.1 version of Jake2 was shown by the JOGL team for JavaOne 2004, to present an example of Java-OpenGL interoperability...
.
LWJGL is available under a
BSD licenseBSD licenses represent a family of permissive free software licenses. The original was used for the Berkeley Software Distribution , a Unix-like operating system after which the license is named. The original owners of BSD were the Regents of the University of California because BSD was first...
, which means it's
open sourceOpen source is an approach to the design, development, and distribution of software, offering practical accessibility to a software's source code. Some consider open source as one of various possible design approaches, while others consider it a critical strategic element of their operations...
and
freely availableFree software, software libre or libre software is software that can be used, studied, and modified without restriction, and which can be copied and redistributed in modified or unmodified form either without restriction, or with minimal restrictions only to ensure that further recipients can also...
.
Version 2.0 was released October 26, 2008, with support for OpenGL 3 and Solaris. The current version is 2.1.0, which was released in March 2009.
See also
- Java OpenGL
Java OpenGL is a wrapper library that allows OpenGL to be used in the Java programming language. It was originally developed by Kenneth Bradley Russell and Christopher John Kline, and is currently being developed by the Game Technology Group at Sun Microsystems, and is the reference implementation...
, another wrapper library that allows OpenGL to be used in Java programming language
External links