Difference between binding VBO data in "InitializeGL" and "play time"

[sylorr]

Hi All,

I am still new to OpenGL and Qt. Thanks for clicking into my post!

I want to draw a bunch of points inside my window (4MB). The way I did it is via QOpenGLWidget, and inherit QOpenGLFunctions_3_3_core. Firstly, I bind the data to VAO & VBO normally, and draw in "paintGL" via "glDrawArrays(GL_POINTS, 0, size)". It works like a charm, no problem.

However, now I want to add a switch on/off option to display my points. And also bind my data dynamically. Say I implement a keyPressEvent, when I press "D", it starts "bindVertexArray, bindBuffer, bufferData" blahblah. Now it won't render anything. (sometimes a single point)

Now my question is why that happens? Do I need to assign "glBufferData" another thread to not to block render thread?

Thanks.
Note: Ubuntu16.04, Qt5.6, OpenGL3.3

---

One guess is that glBufferData() should be in another separated thread other than paintGL(). Since the data I bind is about 4MB, it might block the thread of paintGL(). However, even so, I think it would still be able to render something later some frames.

[sylorr]

Hi I finally got it. Previously I thought glGenBuffers() has allocated some places for me. However, it didn't. Dat's why I cannot attach/update my data during render loop. I should fill in some random data with enough size length to be as a placeholder.

[SGaist]

Hi,

You should post your code so that more people can take a look at to see what might be happening.

[sylorr]

Hi thanks for reminding, there it is

void MyGLWidget::initializeGL()
{
    initializeOpenGLFunctions();

    camera_pos_ = glm::vec3(0.0f, 0.0f, 50.0f);
    camera_dir_ = glm::vec3(0.0f, 0.0f, -1.0f);
    camera_up_ = glm::vec3(1.0f, 0.0f, 0.0f);
    map_model_ = glm::mat4(1.0f);
    projection_ = glm::perspective(glm::radians(45.0f), (float)width()/(float)height(), 0.1f, 1000.0f);
    view_ = glm::lookAt(camera_pos_, camera_pos_ + camera_dir_, camera_up_);

    shader_points = GLShader(context()->functions(), ":/resource/points.vs", ":/resource/points.fs");
    shader_points.use();
    shader_points.setVec3("color", 1.0f, 1.0f, 0.0f);
    shader_points.setMat4("model", model_);
    shader_points.setMat4("view", view_);
    shader_points.setMat4("projection", projection_);

    glGenVertexArrays(1, &vao_points);
    glGenBuffers(1, &vbo_points);
    // Part 1---------------------
    glBindVertexArray(vao_points);
    glBindBuffer(GL_ARRAY_BUFFER, vbo_points);
    glBufferData(GL_ARRAY_BUFFER, sizeof(float) * points.size(), &points[0], GL_DYNAMIC_DRAW);
    glVertexAttribPointer(0, 3, GL_FLOAT, GL_FALSE, sizeof(Vertex), (void*)0);
    glEnableVertexAttribArray(0);
    glBindVertexArray(0);  
    // Part 1 ends----------------
}

void MyGLWidget::paintGL()
{
    glClearColor(0.0f, 0.0f, 0.0f, 1.0f);
    glClear(GL_COLOR_BUFFER_BIT);
    if(render_points){
        shader_points.use();
        glBindVertexArray(vao_points);
        glDrawArrays(GL_POINTS, 0, points.size());
    }
}

void MyGLWidget::keyPressEvent(QKeyEvent *event)
{
    if(event->key() == Qt::Key_Q){
        std::cout << "could render" << std::endl;
        render_points = true;
        // Part 1 place holder
        // code
    }
}

Basically, I set a "Q" press event to turn on the rendered points. In "points", it is a vector of float, It's around 4MB data in total and I load it from fstream at the beginning (in constructor). The above code could normally render on my QOpenGLWidget.
However when I move my "glBufferData()" part (Part1 in initializeGL()) to keyPressEvent() (Part1 place holder), it won't render anything.

I think it's probably I should separate the render thread and glBufferData() thread. Perhaps what happens is that the BufferData thread blocks render thread. If so, would TheadPool in Qt help with it? I haven't wrote some real multi-thread code before...So seeking for advice, thanks a lot.

[sylorr]

@SGaist May I ask if paintGL() would automatically swapBuffer()?

[sylorr]

Hi I finally got it. Previously I thought glGenBuffers() has allocated some places for me. However, it didn't. Dat's why I cannot attach/update my data during render loop. I should fill in some random data with enough size length to be as a placeholder.