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The project history isn't usually what a user wants to read first when they read about a project, so let's remove it from the front-page of the documentation. Reviewed-by: Eric Anholt <eric@anholt.net> Part-of: <https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/mesa/mesa/-/merge_requests/7709>
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96 lines
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Project History
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===============
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The Mesa project was originally started by Brian Paul. Here's a short
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history of the project.
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August, 1993: I begin working on Mesa in my spare time. The project has
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no name at that point. I was simply interested in writing a simple 3D
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graphics library that used the then-new OpenGL API. I was partially
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inspired by the *VOGL* library which emulated a subset of IRIS GL. I had
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been programming with IRIS GL since 1991.
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November 1994: I contact SGI to ask permission to distribute my
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OpenGL-like graphics library on the internet. SGI was generally
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receptive to the idea and after negotiations with SGI's legal
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department, I get permission to release it.
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February 1995: Mesa 1.0 is released on the internet. I expected that a
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few people would be interested in it, but not thousands. I was soon
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receiving patches, new features and thank-you notes on a daily basis.
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That encouraged me to continue working on Mesa. The name Mesa just
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popped into my head one day. SGI had asked me not to use the terms
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*"Open"* or *"GL"* in the project name and I didn't want to make up a
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new acronym. Later, I heard of the Mesa programming language and the
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Mesa spreadsheet for NeXTStep.
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In the early days, OpenGL wasn't available on too many systems. It even
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took a while for SGI to support it across their product line. Mesa
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filled a big hole during that time. For a lot of people, Mesa was their
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first introduction to OpenGL. I think SGI recognized that Mesa actually
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helped to promote the OpenGL API, so they didn't feel threatened by the
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project.
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1995-1996: I continue working on Mesa both during my spare time and
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during my work hours at the Space Science and Engineering Center at the
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University of Wisconsin in Madison. My supervisor, Bill Hibbard, lets me
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do this because Mesa is now being using for the
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`Vis5D <https://www.ssec.wisc.edu/%7Ebillh/vis.html>`__ project.
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October 1996: Mesa 2.0 is released. It implements the OpenGL 1.1
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specification.
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March 1997: Mesa 2.2 is released. It supports the new 3dfx Voodoo
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graphics card via the Glide library. It's the first really popular
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hardware OpenGL implementation for Linux.
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September 1998: Mesa 3.0 is released. It's the first publicly-available
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implementation of the OpenGL 1.2 API.
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March 1999: I attend my first OpenGL ARB meeting. I contribute to the
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development of several official OpenGL extensions over the years.
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September 1999: I'm hired by Precision Insight, Inc. Mesa is a key
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component of 3D hardware acceleration in the new DRI project for
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XFree86. Drivers for 3dfx, 3dLabs, Intel, Matrox and ATI hardware soon
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follow.
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October 2001: Mesa 4.0 is released. It implements the OpenGL 1.3
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specification.
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November 2001: I cofounded Tungsten Graphics, Inc. with Keith Whitwell,
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Jens Owen, David Dawes and Frank LaMonica. Tungsten Graphics was
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acquired by VMware in December 2008.
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November 2002: Mesa 5.0 is released. It implements the OpenGL 1.4
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specification.
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January 2003: Mesa 6.0 is released. It implements the OpenGL 1.5
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specification as well as the GL_ARB_vertex_program and
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GL_ARB_fragment_program extensions.
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June 2007: Mesa 7.0 is released, implementing the OpenGL 2.1
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specification and OpenGL Shading Language.
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2008: Keith Whitwell and other Tungsten Graphics employees develop
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`Gallium <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gallium3D>`__ - a new GPU
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abstraction layer. The latest Mesa drivers are based on Gallium and
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other APIs such as OpenVG are implemented on top of Gallium.
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February 2012: Mesa 8.0 is released, implementing the OpenGL 3.0
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specification and version 1.30 of the OpenGL Shading Language.
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July 2016: Mesa 12.0 is released, including OpenGL 4.3 support and
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initial support for Vulkan for Intel GPUs. Plus, there's another Gallium
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software driver ("swr") based on LLVM and developed by Intel.
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Ongoing: Mesa is the OpenGL implementation for devices designed by
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Intel, AMD, NVIDIA, Qualcomm, Broadcom, Vivante, plus the VMware and
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VirGL virtual GPUs. There's also several software-based renderers:
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swrast (the legacy Mesa rasterizer), softpipe (a Gallium reference
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driver), llvmpipe (LLVM/JIT-based high-speed rasterizer) and swr
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(another LLVM-based driver).
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Work continues on the drivers and core Mesa to implement newer versions
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of the OpenGL, OpenGL ES and Vulkan specifications.
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