VMD-L Mailing List

From: Joshua A. Anderson (joaander_at_umich.edu)
Date: Wed Jan 26 2011 - 14:17:05 CST

Hi all, got a little problem with GLSL on my new iMac at work. I've got build of VMD 1.8.7 compiled in x86_64, and with python support enabled, on 10.6. It works great on my laptop w/ NVIDIA GPU. My new iMac at work has an ATI 5750 and GLSL isn't working there.

on iMac with x86_64 build
Info) Multithreading available, 8 CPUs detected.
Info) OpenGL renderer: ATI Radeon HD 5750 OpenGL Engine
Info) Features: STENCIL MTX NPOT PS GLSL(VF)
Info) GLSL rendering mode is NOT available.
Info) Textures: 2-D (8192x8192), 3-D (16384x16384x16384), Multitexture (8)

away from my laptop now, but I do remember GLSL working there.... at least I think it is.
My build is made with the options: MACOSXX86_64 FLTK FLTKOPENGL IMD TK TCL SILENT PTHREADS LIBTACHYON NETCDF PYTHON NUMPY LP64

When I try the provided 1.8.7 binaries (32-bit) from the web page, I get this on the iMac:
Info) Multithreading available, 8 CPUs detected.
Info) OpenGL renderer: ATI Radeon HD 5750 OpenGL Engine
Info) Features: STENCIL MDE CVA MTX NPOT PP PS GLSL(OVF)
Info) Full GLSL rendering mode is available.
Info) Textures: 2-D (8192x8192), 3-D (16384x16384x16384), Multitexture (8)

Setting VMDGLSLVERBOSE=1 does not seem to produce any extra output.

Any ideas where to go next?

Looking through the code, it seems that the missing O in the GLSL print line indicates that the 64-bit OpenGL driver is reporting that it doesn't have the shader objects extension.
Is this just a "feature" that ATI put in to prevent GLSL with 64-bit openGL on their cards? Or is it possible I compiled/linked something incorrectly?

This page from apple <http://developer.apple.com/graphicsimaging/opengl/capabilities/index.html> seems to indicate that the extension should be available... will keep digging.

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Joshua A. Anderson, Ph.D.
Chemical Engineering Department, University of Michigan