Re: [Public WebGL] another proposal to temporarily expose some device/driver information only when really needed

[Thor Harald Johansen <thj@thj.no>]

> > How about adding a flag (false by default) that allows an acquired
> > context to be queried and configured before activation?
>
> That is what the {async:true} flag is going to be, once we have specified and implemented async context creation.

Ah! You're referring to what I'd call a "non-blocking" call, then? With 
things like node.js being all the rage, "asynchronous" has kind of come 
to mean "event callback" to many developers.

Even "non-blocking" isn't a very good term. The main benefit here is not 
the speed of the call, but the delayed resource creation that allows for 
additional setup. I am struggling to find a good word for the concept, 
really. It's not really asynchronous if it synchronizes with the first 
call that requires hardware resources, is it...

Still, is there actually a need for an explicit flag? Neither the 
programmer nor the end user is going to see a visual difference between 
"no resources allocated yet" vs "nothing rendered yet". My original 
point was that it seems entirely possible to allow the following:

var gl = canvas.getContext("webgl");
var caps = gl.getDeviceCaps();
gl.enableSomeCap();

var buffer = gl.createBuffer(); // HW context auto-created here
...
...

...and then drop passing flags into getContext() altogether?

Thor

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