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+freeglut is a completely OpenSourced alternative to the OpenGL Utility +Toolkit (GLUT) library. GLUT was originally written by Mark Kilgard +to support the sample programs in the second edition OpenGL 'RedBook'. +Since then, GLUT has been used in a wide variety of practical applications +because it is simple, universally available and highly portable. +
+GLUT (and hence freeglut) allows the user to create and manage +windows containing OpenGL contexts on a wide range of platforms and +also read the mouse, keyboard and joystick functions. +
+freeglut is released under the X-Consortium license. +
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+The original GLUT library seems to have been abandoned with the most +recent version (3.7) dating back to August 1998. It's license does +not allow anyone to distribute modified the library code. This would +be OK, if not for the fact that GLUT is getting old and really needs +improvement. Also, GLUT's license is incompatible with some software +distributions (eg Xfree86). +
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+freeglut was originally written by Pawel W. Olszta with contributions +from Andreas Umbach and Steve Baker. Steve is now the official +owner/maintainer of freeglut. +
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+Pawel started freeglut development on December 1st, 1999. +The project is now a virtually 100% replacement for the original +GLUT with only a few departures (such as the abandonment of SGI-specific +features such as the Dials&Buttons box and Dynamic Video Resolution). +
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+Check the +downloads page for the latest release. +
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+Send freeglut related questions to the appropriate freeglut mailing list: +
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+I believe this is enough for a short introduction. +If you are not tired of reading yet, check out the +freeglut project log. Here you will find the +yet-to-be-introduced new project structure +description. Finally, here you will find the latest +work progress report. Since freeglut is +a re-implementation of the original GLUT API, you can find API +documentation at http://www.opengl.org. +
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