Buffering Output

turtleware.eu

6 pointsjackdaniel3 comments

Do any operating systems expose mixed buffering (for real screen rendering) to applications? I know Windows used to allow full-screen apps to implement single buffering, but I don't know if it could seamlessly transition into double buffering.

I think that it is up to the toolkit you use. For example with Wayland you could work with a single buffer and commit it, or work with two buffers and swap them. Moreover you can do things on the client side, say:

drawing-buffer (single) [user copies to] -> commit-buffer ---------------------------------- [system copies to] -> screen

alternatively

drawing-buffer (double) [user swaps to] -> commit-buffer ---------------------------------- [system copies to] -> screen

etc.

A brief blog post about output buffering in graphical applications.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com