A Tool for New DOS Programming -- Introduction to Allegro - China DOS Union Forum

Allegro is a famous programming library in recent years, very powerful and practical. Now let's give a simple introduction:

Allegro is a portable library mainly aimed at video game and multimedia programming. It was originally started by Shawn Hargreaves for the DJGPP compiler in a mix of C and assembler.
According to the Oxford Companion to Music, Allegro is the Italian for "quick, lively, bright". It is also a recursive acronym which stands for "Allegro Low LEvel Game ROutines".

Graphic functions (图形功能)

Vectorial drawing:
pixels, lines, rectangles, circles, ellipses, arcs, Bezier splines
shape fill, with or without pattern
polygons: flat, Gouraud, textured and translucent
Sprites:
masked, compressed and compiled sprites
blitting, rotation, stretching, reduction, alpha blending, Gouraud shading
native support for BMP, LBM, PCX and TGA files (others supported with library extensions)
Color palettes:
color palette manipulation (reading, writing, conversion)
conversion of color formats RGB HSV
Texts:
text output in Unicode format (masking, colouring, alignment)
Misc:
draw directly on the screen or on any-size memory bitmaps
hardware scrolling and triple buffering (where available), mode-X split screen
animation functions for FLI/FLC format

Graphic drivers

Dos:
VGA 13h mode
mode-X (23 VGA resolution plus unchained 640x400 extended mode)
SVGA modes in 8, 15, 16, 24 and 32 bits per pixel
linear VBE 2.0 framebuffer access
hardware acceleration through VBE/AF API if supported
additional graphic drivers through FreeBE/AF project

Sound functions (声音功能)

Midi:
native MIDI music format support (with 64 simultaneous effects)
dynamic control/response to music note on, note off, main volume, pan, pitch bend, and program change
uses General MIDI patches
you can read in wavetable patches for MIDI files (SF2 and GUS patches)
Wave:
native support of WAV and VOC file formats (playing looped forward, backwards or bidirectional)
streaming audio
modify volume, pan, pitch, etc during play

Sound drivers

Dos:
Adlib, SB, SB Pro, SB16, AWE32
MPU-401
ESS AudioDrive
Ensoniq Soundscape
Windows Sound System

Math functions (数学功能)

fixed point aritmetic and trigonometric routines
precalculated trigonometric tables
vector/matrix/quaternions 3d manipulation (translation, rotation, scaling, projection)

Misc (其它功能)

mouse, keyboard and joystick management
high resolution interruption timers (resolution of 10, 5 or less ms depending on platform)
vertical retrace symulation under DOS
manipulate configuration files
manipulate compressed files in LZSS format
manipulate multi-object resource-like compressed datafiles
tool for creating datafiles (grabber)
simple GUI for dialogs and file selector

Floor1　Wengier	Posted 2003-05-24 00:00
系统支持　Posts 10,521　Credits 27,736
Allegro is a famous programming library in recent years, very powerful and practical. Now let's give a simple introduction: Allegro is a portable library mainly aimed at video game and multimedia programming. It was originally started by Shawn Hargreaves for the DJGPP compiler in a mix of C and assembler. According to the Oxford Companion to Music, Allegro is the Italian for "quick, lively, bright". It is also a recursive acronym which stands for "Allegro Low LEvel Game ROutines". Graphic functions (图形功能) Vectorial drawing: pixels, lines, rectangles, circles, ellipses, arcs, Bezier splines shape fill, with or without pattern polygons: flat, Gouraud, textured and translucent Sprites: masked, compressed and compiled sprites blitting, rotation, stretching, reduction, alpha blending, Gouraud shading native support for BMP, LBM, PCX and TGA files (others supported with library extensions) Color palettes: color palette manipulation (reading, writing, conversion) conversion of color formats RGB HSV Texts: text output in Unicode format (masking, colouring, alignment) Misc: draw directly on the screen or on any-size memory bitmaps hardware scrolling and triple buffering (where available), mode-X split screen animation functions for FLI/FLC format Graphic drivers Dos: VGA 13h mode mode-X (23 VGA resolution plus unchained 640x400 extended mode) SVGA modes in 8, 15, 16, 24 and 32 bits per pixel linear VBE 2.0 framebuffer access hardware acceleration through VBE/AF API if supported additional graphic drivers through FreeBE/AF project Sound functions (声音功能) Midi: native MIDI music format support (with 64 simultaneous effects) dynamic control/response to music note on, note off, main volume, pan, pitch bend, and program change uses General MIDI patches you can read in wavetable patches for MIDI files (SF2 and GUS patches) Wave: native support of WAV and VOC file formats (playing looped forward, backwards or bidirectional) streaming audio modify volume, pan, pitch, etc during play Sound drivers Dos: Adlib, SB, SB Pro, SB16, AWE32 MPU-401 ESS AudioDrive Ensoniq Soundscape Windows Sound System Math functions (数学功能) fixed point aritmetic and trigonometric routines precalculated trigonometric tables vector/matrix/quaternions 3d manipulation (translation, rotation, scaling, projection) Misc (其它功能) mouse, keyboard and joystick management high resolution interruption timers (resolution of 10, 5 or less ms depending on platform) vertical retrace symulation under DOS manipulate configuration files manipulate compressed files in LZSS format manipulate multi-object resource-like compressed datafiles tool for creating datafiles (grabber) simple GUI for dialogs and file selector

Floor2　Wengier	Posted 2003-06-02 00:00
系统支持　Posts 10,521　Credits 27,736
Bump!