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Comment by pjmlp | Hacker News Reader

> Why deprecate OpenGL and not support Vulkan, Apple? Even with DirectX, Microsoft always maintained updated OpenGL on their platform...

A platform owner is free to do whatever it feels like on their platform, provided it respects the law.

You are quite outdated about the state of OpenGL in Windows.

The only thing Microsoft did was to let ICD drivers be around for desktop applications. OpenGL is not supported on UWP or Win32 store apps, nor the Windows 10 UI compositor.

Finally, contrary to OpenGL urban myths,game consoles always favored their own 3D APIs, with the exception of OpenGL ES 1.0's failure on the PS3.

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> > Why deprecate OpenGL and not support Vulkan, Apple? Even with DirectX, Microsoft always maintained updated OpenGL on their platform...

> A platform owner is free to do whatever it feels like on their platform, provided it respects the law.

The law that would come to mind here is the Sherman Antitrust Act: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Cor....

"The plaintiffs alleged that Microsoft abused monopoly power on Intel-based personal computers in its handling of operating system and web browser sales"

Thing is, Apple platforms aren't a monopoly at the eye of the law.

You are free to just use something else with bigger market share.

Can I just change that to

"The plaintiffs alleged that Apple abused monopoly power on A10, A10x, and A11 based smartphones and tablet computers in its handling of operating system and web browser sales"

Would that make it a monopoly?

IIRC Apple didn't sell Intel based machines when Microsoft lost this case so IIRC there was only the tiny Linux market (at the time) relative to MS. No one else sells A10, A10x, and A11 based devices so Apple does have a monopoly there by that definition.

I'm frustrated that I can't replace Apple Maps with Google Maps so that it's the integrated "map" function in iOS. I can't use real Chrome, which has a proven record of being faster and more secure than Safari, on my iPhone, even if it happened to use more battery. Frustrated can't make gmail my default mail app so clicking a mailto link goes to Apple's Mail app. I'm frustrated that it's extremely hard to run GPLed software on iOS (requires $99 a year and self-signing or free and resigning every week). No Kodi. No EMUs.

I would love to see Apple change their polices there.

“Monopoly” is a term which can only be used in the context of a market. A market is defined only by the demand for some specific utility. iOS devices do not form their own market as the utility they provide is also provided by other products.

Normally I'd just agree, but... That doesn't jive with the "intel-based" part of the original version, though. A desktop is a desktop, and while there is a type of compatibility that matters to most users it's not the processor. So why is that use fair but not the other?

Because the part quoted there is just one line that doesn't fully represent the case or the world in which it was set. At the time, there was no significant consumer market share for non-Intel-based computers. Microsoft had a monopoly on the personal computer operating system market. Saying that Apple has a monopoly on their own products isn't meaningful.

No, because you fail to understand law.

Apple does not have a monopoly regardless how many times you type the word, and come up with your own definitions.

I agree. On a side note, wouldn't that somewhat mean that 11billion fine on Google is not justified.

> with the exception of OpenGL ES 1.0's failure on the PS3.

Got a source on that one? I did plenty of work on the PS3 and never heard anyone complaining about that(the SPUs on the other hand, not many people were ready for massive vectorization).

Also X360 was DirectX based, I knew plenty of PC engines that ported straight over(although with a ton of pain when they realized they couldn't call malloc all over the place).

The failure was not technical, rather that most developers ignored it and rather used Phyre Engine or libGCM.

As for a source, here is one from Sandstorm developers.

https://sandstormgames.ca/2011/07/22/debug-playstation3/

<quote>

At one point, Sony was asking developers whether they would be interested in having PSGL conform to the OpenGL ES 2.0 specs (link here). This has unfortunately never happened however, as developers seem to have mostly preferred to go with libGCM as their main graphics API of choice on PS3. This has meant that the development environment has started becoming more libGCM-centric over the years with PSGL eventually becoming a second-class citizen – in fact, new features like 3D stereo mode is not even possible unless you are using libGCM directly.

</quote>

I assume as former PS3 dev you also have access to the GLESTutorial07_Arnaud_Remi_PSGL.pdf done at GDC 2006, otherwise you can get it from https://tinyurl.com/yajn75h2.

I think he meant that few ever used OpenGL on PS3, not that everyone had been complaining about it. I, for one, have not heard of any AAA game using it though some indies might have.

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