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Show HN: WebGL Enabler for iOS

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Re: Show HN: WebGL Enabler for iOS

#12

Like how Apple has sabotaged the use of HTML5 Audio, I think it is unlikely they will enable WebGL. It provides developers an open platform for developing games, which conflicts with Apple's closed system agenda.

Apple has helped keep OpenGL alive. Microsoft is the company that simply refuses to support it. Think we'll be seeing WebGL on IE anytime soon? Microsoft could have gone with OpenGL but they invented DirectX instead on the desktop. Apple does support OpenGL on their phone, it's just not in the browser, so I would think writing games for Android and iOS should be doable, right? Windows Phone 8? Probably not.

Re: Show HN: WebGL Enabler for iOS

#13
post #11

WebGL Enabler won't work well with all existing WebGL demos, but there's a cache of them to tryout at http://www.webgl.com and http://www.chromeexperiments.com

Two things to note about testing existing demos/games: 1) It supports 0 vertex shader texture units, which breaks some of the more interesting demos (I think this is an implementation thing, rather than a hardware limitation, at least on the higher end devices; the iPad 3 has to support this stuff), 2) Most demos and games use onmousedown/move/up rather than ontouch*, which causes them to break. I'm trying to come up with a decent solution to run these existing demos.

Re: Show HN: WebGL Enabler for iOS

#14

Like how Apple has sabotaged the use of HTML5 Audio, I think it is unlikely they will enable WebGL. It provides developers an open platform for developing games, which conflicts with Apple's closed system agenda.

How have they sabotaged HTML Audio?

Re: Show HN: WebGL Enabler for iOS

#15
post #9
post #6

You're encouraging people to pay for this internal setting toggle, that Apple didn't default to 'On' for a reason (not being finished)? Where is the value in this? You are basically charging for Apples incomplete software.

The value is that people want to use WebGL now, as seen by the almost 1000 people who have downloaded the software over the last few days. However, I have no idea how one can put a price on something of this sort, which is why you could pay $0 or $500 for it if you want. I tend to believe that saving people from a couple of hours of tinkering (writing the same tweak I have, basically) is worth at least $1, but people…

But they're not "using" WebGL other than seeing a demo of it. There's absolutely no interaction. I bet at least half of your downloads expect they'll magically be able to have fully compatible WebGL games. Now that would be software worth paying for, provided it wasn't a settings toggle.

Re: Show HN: WebGL Enabler for iOS

#16

This is badass! But, once again something Apple should have already given developers. Thanks for putting this together, hopefully it spurs them along.

It's not like Apple forgot about this feature. It just isn't ready which is why it's not enabled. It will be released when it's ready.

Re: Show HN: WebGL Enabler for iOS

#17
post #15
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The value is that people want to use WebGL now, as seen by the almost 1000 people who have downloaded the software over the last few days. However, I have no idea how one can put a price on something of this sort, which is why you could pay $0 or $500 for it if you want. I tend to believe that saving people from a couple of hours of tinkering (writing the same tweak I have, basically) is worth at least $1, but people…

But they're not "using" WebGL other than seeing a demo of it. There's absolutely no interaction. I bet at least half of your downloads expect they'll magically be able to have fully compatible WebGL games. Now that would be software worth paying for, provided it wasn't a settings toggle.

Err, what? You do have full compatibility with WebGL with this. Any failings there are on the part of games are due to a lack of proper event handling (specifically, not using ontouch* events).

And again, "worth paying for" is up to the customers. I very much encourage people to download it and then pay for it if they see value in it. So far people have seen value in it.

Re: Show HN: WebGL Enabler for iOS

#18
post #14

Like how Apple has sabotaged the use of HTML5 Audio, I think it is unlikely they will enable WebGL. It provides developers an open platform for developing games, which conflicts with Apple's closed system agenda.

How have they sabotaged HTML Audio?

By not supporting Ogg Vorbis on Desktop and totally fucking it up on Mobile on purpose:

http://www.phoboslab.org/log/2011/03/the-state-of-html5-audi... (Year old, but still valid)

Re: Show HN: WebGL Enabler for iOS

#19
post #17
post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But they're not "using" WebGL other than seeing a demo of it. There's absolutely no interaction. I bet at least half of your downloads expect they'll magically be able to have fully compatible WebGL games. Now that would be software worth paying for, provided it wasn't a settings toggle.

Err, what? You do have full compatibility with WebGL with this. Any failings there are on the part of games are due to a lack of proper event handling (specifically, not using ontouch* events). And again, "worth paying for" is up to the customers. I very much encourage people to download it and then pay for it if they see value in it. So far people have seen value in it.

Device data (touches, accelerometer, etc) are exactly what I meant by compatibility. Again, back to my point of it not being finished. I see that it wasn't your fault, but this is misleading and shady.

Re: Show HN: WebGL Enabler for iOS

#20
post #19
post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Err, what? You do have full compatibility with WebGL with this. Any failings there are on the part of games are due to a lack of proper event handling (specifically, not using ontouch* events). And again, "worth paying for" is up to the customers. I very much encourage people to download it and then pay for it if they see value in it. So far people have seen value in it.

Device data (touches, accelerometer, etc) are exactly what I meant by compatibility. Again, back to my point of it not being finished. I see that it wasn't your fault, but this is misleading and shady.

I don't think you understand. All of these things are there. In addition, these have nothing to do with WebGL. You're painting this to be something that it's very much not.

My tweak has been confirmed to work by everyone who has tried it, and it works quite nicely. You're saying that I'm being "misleading and shady", when in reality the full functionality is there.

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