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alcinnz

Question: What was graphics programming like in early versions of Mac OS or Windows? Before GPUs became mainstays?

Who can tell me?

Having gained an understanding of what computer graphics involves, creating GUIs on 1980s or early 90s CPUs seems like quite the accomplishment!

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mathew

@alcinnz The most tedious part is that there was no compositor. When a window was moved and part of your application window was exposed as a result, you were handed the coordinates and expected to redraw that part of your window, and not anything that was now covered up.

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wizzwizz4

@mathew @alcinnz I'm disappointed we can't still do this. If you've got a graphically-intensive rendering process, it used to be that you could use other windows to cover it up, and make it run faster. Nowadays, it's not clear how to write a program that behaves this way.

alcinnz

@wizzwizz4 @mathew I've heard Apple say Safari includes such features...

Nov 16, 2024, 05:42 PM·Quiet public
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mathew

@alcinnz @wizzwizz4 I don't know about Safari, but it's possible to get information about the different layers being composited onto the screen in OS X. There's an open source screenshot program called ScreenToLayers that pulls them out into individual layers in a Photoshop file.

github.com/duyquoc/ScreenToLay

GitHubGitHub - duyquoc/ScreenToLayers: macOS app to capture your screen as a layered PSD filemacOS app to capture your screen as a layered PSD file - duyquoc/ScreenToLayers
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