EGL - Native Platform Interface
EGL is an interface between Khronos rendering APIs such as OpenGL ES and the underlying native platform window system.
EGL handles graphics context management, surface/buffer binding, and rendering synchronization and enables high-performance, accelerated, mixed-mode 2D and 3D rendering using other Khronos APIs. EGL also provides interop capability between Khronos to enable efficient transfer of data between APIs – for example between a video subsystem and a GPU running OpenGL ES.
EGL at a Glance
EGL provides mechanisms for creating rendering surfaces onto which client APIs like OpenGL ES can draw, creates graphics contexts for client APIs, and synchronizes drawing by client APIs as well as native platform rendering APIs. This enables seamless rendering of OpenGL ES for high-performance, accelerated, mixed-mode 2D and 3D rendering.
Portable Layer for Graphics Resource Management
EGL can be implemented on multiple operating systems (such as Android and Linux) and native window systems (such as X and Microsoft Windows). Implementations may also choose to allow rendering into specific types of EGL surfaces via other supported native rendering APIs, such as Xlib or GDI. EGL provides:
- Mechanisms for creating rendering surfaces (windows, pbuffers, pixmaps) onto which client APIs can draw and share
- Methods to create and manage graphics contexts for client APIs
- Ways to synchronize drawing by client APIs as well as native platform rendering APIs.
Advanced API Interop
The EGLStreams extension provides a powerful but easily programmed API to control how a stream of images flow between Khronos APIs to enable advanced applications such as Augmented Reality with full hardware acceleration.
Essential Resources
- Khronos Registry - specification, header files, and optional extension specifications
- SDK Reference Pages
- Quick Reference Guide
- Community Forums