Working with Graphics APIs - Essentials of Interactive Computer Graphics - page 84

4

Working with Graphics APIs

This chapter introduces a framework for developing programs with modern graph-
ics APIs. This chapter:

• discusses the relationships between graphics APIs and GUI APIs in inter-
active graphics applications;

• introduces a framework to encapsulate the principles of programming with
modern graphics APIs;

• uses the framework to further explain the graphics API function calls from
Tutorial 3.1;

• demonstrates tutorials that implement the framework abstraction.

After this chapter we should be able to:

• understand the principles of working with graphics APIs;

• understand approaches to abstract and customize graphics APIs for our ap-
plications to increase readability and to hide complexities.

In addition, given the source code of simple computer graphics programs, we
should be able to

• identify and understand graphics API initialization and configuration calls,
independent of the implementation technology (e.g.

programming lan-

guages, APIs);

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