Programming 3D Sound With OpenAL

cardinals33 · 06-07-2003, 11:32 PM

<html><h1 align="center">Programming 3D Sound With OpenAL</h1>By: Dan Ricart 

As the capabilities of sound cards and sound APIs have increased over the years, 3D sound has played an increasingly important role in games. Creating an immersive experience for the gamer goes beyond nice looking graphics. Done correctly, ambient sound and music can take games to a whole new level. To achieve this effect, different sound programming APIs have been developed such as Microsoft's DirectSound and DirectSound3D, Aureal's A3D and Creative Labs EAX. More recently, Loki Entertainment and Creative Labs have developed OpenAL. They have done this in an effort to create a more standard, cross-platform API to allow developers to add sound to any title. This article explains the basics of OpenAL and how to get started adding 3D sound to your project.

OpenAL is basically an audio library that contains functions for playing back sounds and music in a game environment. It allows a programmer to load whatever sounds they like and control certain characteristics such as position, velocity, direction and angles for cones that determine how the sound is traveling. All sounds are positioned relative to the listener which represents the current place in the game universe where the user is. The closer the listener gets to a sound, the louder it gets. OpenAL can also be used for the playback of music. OpenAL can make use of streaming to continuously play music back in the background. OpenAL supports the use of DirectSound3D and EAX. There are functions contained in the library that allow the use of these APIs without any extra programming.

The main advantage of OpenAL over DirectSound and EAX is that OpenAL is designed to be a cross platform API. It is possible to download Windows, Mac and
Linux binaries of it so it can be used on many Operating Systems. DirectSound and DirectSound3D were designed only for Windows and EAX is basically an extension of DirectSound3D. For those wishing to create an application for multiple Operating Systems, OpenAL might be the way to go. This tutorial is designed to show you how to get basic functionality out of OpenAL in Windows. The code shown here is from the demo application that you can download which contains the complete example. OpenGL is used for the rendering so the demo
shows some similarities between OpenGL and OpenAL. 

Getting Started

The first thing to do is to obtain the OpenAL SDK. This can be obtained from Creative Labs developer site at [url=http://developer.creative.com]. Once the SDK is set up you can begin using its functions. You will first need to initialize OpenAL at the start of your game or application. For my application I have chosen to use DirectSound3D but it is also possible to make use of EAX. The initialization code looks like this:
ALCcontext *Context;
ALCdevice *Device;
Device = alcOpenDevice((ALubyte*)"DirectSound3D");
if (Device == NULL)
*** exit(-1);//Create context(s)
Context=alcCreateContext(Device , NULL);
//Set active context
alcMakeContextCurrent(Context);
// Clear Error Code
alGetError();

Loading Sounds

Once OpenAL has been initialized you can start filling buffers with sounds. The first step is to fill a buffer with sound using the alutLoadWAVFile function. Once you have filled the buffer you need to attach it to a source. This source can then be used to play back the sound. The code for loading a sound looks like this:

char* alBuffer;**** *******//data for the buffer
ALenum alFormatBuffer;**** //for the buffer format
ALsizei alFreqBuffer;***** //for the frequency of the buffer
long alBufferLen;********* //the bit depth
ALboolean alLoop;********* //looped
unsigned int alSource;**** //buffer source
unsigned int alSampleSet; 

//load the wave file
alutLoadWAVFile("test.wav",&alF ormatBuffer, (void**) &alBuffer,(unsigned int *)&alBufferLen, &alFreqBuffer, &loop);

//create 1 source
alGenSources(1, &alSource);

//create 1 buffer
alGenBuffers(1, &alSampleSet);

//fills sample set with buffer data from alBuffer
alBufferData(alSampleSet, alFormatBuffer, alBuffer, alBufferLen, alFreqBuffer);

//assign the buffer to this source
alSourcei(alSource, AL_BUFFER, alSampleSet);

//release the data
alutUnloadWAV(alFormatBuffer, alBuffer, alBufferLen, alFreqBuffer);

The first step here was to load the file "test.wav". The data is read in and stored in alBuffer. Next a source and a buffer are created. Then the buffer is filled with data fromalBuffer. Next the buffer is assigned to the source and the wave data is released.

Setting Source Properties

Once you have a sound source set up you will need to set some of its properties. To do this you use the alSource command. This function works similar to functions in OpenGL where different versions of the function exist such as alSourcei,alSourcef, alSource3f, and so on. The properties you are setting determine which function you use. Setting something like pitch for example just needs one floating point parameter so alSourcef is used. The first parameter passed to the function is that of the source you are modifying. The second parameter corresponds to what property you are changing. The rest of the parameters are the actual settings for this property. Here is an example of setting position and velocity for a sound source:

//set source position
alSource3f(alSource,AL_POSITION , xposition, yposition, zposition);

//set source velocity
alSource3f(alSource,AL_VELOCITY , xvelocity, yvelocity, zvelocity);

Here alSource is our sound source andAL_POSITION and AL_VELOCITY signal that we want to change the position and velocity parameters. The rest correspond to floating point numbers with preset values.

Using a Listener

The use of a listener in 3D sound is important so that you have a reference point from which to hear sounds. The closer a listener is to a sound source's position, the louder the sound will get provided there are no obstacles. OpenAL already has a listener object set up so all you need to do is modify its properties as needed. The most important properties of the listener are the position and orientation of the listener. These properties are generally updated once for every loop in a game. The position indicates where the listener currently is while the orientation is where the listener is facing. For example, if a listener is facing west and a sound is coming from the north, the sound will appear to come from the right. However if the user orientation changes and turns to face the north, the sound will now appear to come from straight ahead.

Modifying a listener's properties works similarly to the way you change a sound source's properties. The function alListener is used and has variations depending on the property you are modifying. For example, to set the listener position you can call alListener3f and specify 3 separate floating point numbers or you could call alListenerfv and pass an array of floating point numbers. The parameters for the position are simply the x, y and z values for the listener in the game world. The orientation property however takes 6 parameters. The first 3 are for the vector that corresponds to what the user of listener is currently looking at. The next 3 are for the vector leading straight up from where the listener is facing. Here is an example of setting the listener position and orientation:

float listenerx, listenery, listenerz;
float vec[6];

listenerx=10.0f;
listenery=0.0f;
listenerz=5.0f;

vec[0] = fvecx; //forward vector x value
vec[1] = fvecy; //forward vector y value
vec[2] = fvecz; //forward vector z value
vec[3] = uvecx; //up vector x value
vec[4] = uvecy; //up vector y value
vec[5] = uvecz; //up vector z value

//set current listener position
alListener3f(AL_POSITION, listenerx, listenery, listenerz);

//set current listener orientation
alListenerfv(AL_ORIENTATION, vec);

In the first function call, 3 separate floating point numbers were passed for the x, y and z of the listener's position. For the second call, an array called vec is passed. This array is comprised of the six values for the two vectors dealing with the listener's orientation.

Playing Sounds

Once your sounds are loaded and you have set your listener properties you can then play your sounds. To do this you call the function alSourcePlay. This function takes a single parameter which is the source you want to play. To stop a sound you call the function alSourceStop which also takes the name of the source you want to stop. If you want your sound effect to loop such as if you have a sound of running water, you can set the looping property of the sound to true before playing the sound. Here is some sample code:

//tell the sound to loop continuously
alSourcei(alSource,AL_LOOPING,A L_TRUE);

//play the sound
alSourcePlay(alSource);

To stop the sound:

alSourceStop(alSource);

Cleaning Up

Once you are finished with your program you need to free up your sources and buffers and shut down OpenAL. The commands are relatively simple. Here is how to delete your sources and buffers:

//delete our source
alDeleteSources(1,&alSource);
//delete our buffer
alDeleteBuffers(1,&alSampleSet);

Here the first parameter for each is the number of buffers or sources to be deleted and the second is the buffer or source to be deleted. The last step is to close out OpenAL itself. This is done as follows:

//Get active context
Context=alcGetCurrentContext(); 
//Get device for active context
Device=alcGetContextsDevice(Con text);
//Disable context
alcMakeContextCurrent(NULL);
//Release context(s)
alcDestroyContext(Context);
//Close device
alcCloseDevice(Device);

That's about it for playing basic sounds in OpenAL. The basic steps are to first initialize OpenAL, then load in whatever sounds you need, set the properties of the sounds and listener and then play the sounds. There is a lot more you can do with OpenAL but this was just written to describe some of the basics. The source code that comes along with this demonstrates the use of all of this in an OpenGL demo. In the demo, you control the listener and its position is set to your current position every loop. If you have any questions or comments, e-mail me at ricart3@tcnj.edu

Download the sample application here.
</html>

baldurk · 06-08-2003, 02:32 AM

wow! Cool man

.

You might want to check your code-highlighting font tags though ;P

Noor · 06-08-2003, 07:42 AM

cardinals33: Great Job.... Thank you so much

cardinals33 · 06-08-2003, 12:48 PM

Thanks for the support guys. Hope people can make use of some of the code. If people have ideas for other articles I wouldn't mind writing some more. I was thinking of doing one on EAX and doing 3D sound without OpenAL. I've also done some work streaming Ogg Vorbis files with DirectSound.

davepermen · 06-08-2003, 02:07 PM

looks very nice. i'll read it more carefully when i have time

now its soon utopia-time!! yeah!!

stodge · 06-08-2003, 02:48 PM

Great article! Nice and concise and easy to read. This will come in handy if I decide to use OpenAL instead of SDL_Mixer.

Thanks

donBerto · 06-08-2003, 11:03 PM

stodge: ditto
dave: utopia, your second home?

thanks! great article, great read.

DarkLight · 06-09-2003, 09:15 AM

Great article, cardinals33!

stodge · 06-09-2003, 12:14 PM

A simple 3D sound tutorial using something like SDL_Mixer would certainly be interesting. It would provide a nice comparison with OpenAL and help people choose between the two.

Dia Kharrat · 06-09-2003, 05:13 PM

That's a very good idea stodge...Anyone would like to volunteer for doing an article about SDL_Mixer ?

davepermen · 06-10-2003, 12:47 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by donBerto

dave: utopia, your second home?

nope, my 3rd home.

first: my home (hochbordweg 2)
second: my gf home (rheinstrasse 8)
third: utopia

donBerto · 06-10-2003, 12:44 PM

haha nice! still, I'm surprised you're still able to find time to post!

davepermen · 06-10-2003, 10:15 PM

just don't say it to my boss

lalala. no, really. at home i have currently about _NO_ time.. hehe.

but the project of me gets bigger and bigger (in brain). just need time and energy to code it down.. it will revolutionize the world. this one at least definitely.. or gets noted in some newspapers, what ever. and no, i don't plan yata (yet another terroristic attack

). its just a sweet looking program

davepermen · 06-10-2003, 10:17 PM

it can even be useful for sound... (to get back on the topic).. while too slow today.. one day... we don't know yet.. sound lacks global reflections and all that as well at least.. a current problem of it.. same as we only have direct lighting realtime today, we have only direct "sounding" realtime today.. well, the future's bright, hehe

donBerto · 06-11-2003, 07:48 AM

yeah sorry for hijacking this thread :nervous:

but yes, it would definitely be interesting to see a side-by-side comparison of OpenAL v SDL_mixer.

fletcher · 08-23-2003, 08:22 AM

Does anyone have a link to discussion or graphics to illustrate INNER_ and OUTER_CONE_ANGLE ??

baldurk · 08-24-2003, 02:22 AM

I don't want to start the necromancy argument again, but did that really have to be posted here? I mean, I personally would have started a new thread.

davepermen · 08-24-2003, 05:07 AM

this time, i'll agree with you

baldurk · 08-24-2003, 11:38 AM

now maybe you can see why necromancy can be bad ;P

i2eye · 10-13-2003, 07:00 PM

Hi, I'm a newbie in this openAL world, just checking out how this example works...
But I got stuck in getting these compiling errors:

Compiling...
alsound.cpp
dinput.cpp
e:\geewoo\project\openal\openaltut\dinput.cpp(9) : error C2146: syntax error : missing ';' before identifier 'g_DI'
e:\geewoo\project\openal\openaltut\dinput.cpp(9) : error C2501: 'LPDIRECTINPUT8' : missing storage-class or type specifiers
e:\geewoo\project\openal\openaltut\dinput.cpp(9) : fatal error C1004: unexpected end of file found
main.cpp
e:\geewoo\project\openal\openaltut\main.cpp(24) : error C2146: syntax error : missing ';' before identifier 'g_KDIDev'
e:\geewoo\project\openal\openaltut\main.cpp(24) : fatal error C1004: unexpected end of file found
Error executing cl.exe.

openaltest.exe - 5 error(s), 0 warning(s)

I didn't make any changes in the source code. Does anybody have an idea what's wrong with this? I think I've linked all the library files needed...

baldurk · 10-14-2003, 02:49 AM

this is just a guess, but I'd say you're not including a header you need. Looks like a DX one, but I couldn't say for sure.

i2eye · 10-15-2003, 01:26 AM

Well, I don't really know what happened actually, but it got to work somehow.
I figured out something was wrong with my computer, because it had problems with openGL & DirectX sources also. So I just re-installed everything(starting from win2k...). Thank you anyway.

yjh1982 · 10-28-2004, 11:00 PM

bug openal is GPL lisence.
is mean your program must GPL?

I am not like GPL;BSD or zlib is greater.

SpreeTree · 10-29-2004, 12:55 AM

No, if you use OpenAL your final program doesnt need to be GPL based. If that was the case then big companies out there wouldnt use it e.g. Epic Games.

Spree

yjh1982 · 10-31-2004, 05:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SpreeTree

No, if you use OpenAL your final program doesnt need to be GPL based. If that was the case then big companies out there wouldnt use it e.g. Epic Games.

Spree

[snapback]13438[/snapback]

is mean,OpenAL use two lisence?as mysql ,QT?

06-07-2003, 11:32 PM	#1
cardinals33 New Member Join Date: May 2003 Posts: 2	<html><h1 align="center">Programming 3D Sound With OpenAL</h1><p align="center">By: Dan Ricart </p> As the capabilities of sound cards and sound APIs have increased over the years, 3D sound has played an increasingly important role in games. Creating an immersive experience for the gamer goes beyond nice looking graphics. Done correctly, ambient sound and music can take games to a whole new level. To achieve this effect, different sound programming APIs have been developed such as Microsoft's DirectSound and DirectSound3D, Aureal's A3D and Creative Labs EAX. More recently, Loki Entertainment and Creative Labs have developed OpenAL. They have done this in an effort to create a more standard, cross-platform API to allow developers to add sound to any title. This article explains the basics of OpenAL and how to get started adding 3D sound to your project.</p> OpenAL is basically an audio library that contains functions for playing back sounds and music in a game environment. It allows a programmer to load whatever sounds they like and control certain characteristics such as position, velocity, direction and angles for cones that determine how the sound is traveling. All sounds are positioned relative to the listener which represents the current place in the game universe where the user is. The closer the listener gets to a sound, the louder it gets. OpenAL can also be used for the playback of music. OpenAL can make use of streaming to continuously play music back in the background. OpenAL supports the use of DirectSound3D and EAX. There are functions contained in the library that allow the use of these APIs without any extra programming.</p> The main advantage of OpenAL over DirectSound and EAX is that OpenAL is designed to be a cross platform API. It is possible to download Windows, Mac and Linux binaries of it so it can be used on many Operating Systems. DirectSound and DirectSound3D were designed only for Windows and EAX is basically an extension of DirectSound3D. For those wishing to create an application for multiple Operating Systems, OpenAL might be the way to go. This tutorial is designed to show you how to get basic functionality out of OpenAL in Windows. The code shown here is from the demo application that you can download which contains the complete example. OpenGL is used for the rendering so the demo shows some similarities between OpenGL and OpenAL. </p> Getting Started</p> The first thing to do is to obtain the OpenAL SDK. This can be obtained from Creative Labs developer site at [url=http://developer.creative.com]. Once the SDK is set up you can begin using its functions. You will first need to initialize OpenAL at the start of your game or application. For my application I have chosen to use DirectSound3D but it is also possible to make use of EAX. The initialization code looks like this:</p> <p class="codeNormal"><span class="codeNormal">ALCcontext Context; ALCdevice Device; Device = alcOpenDevice((ALubyte)"DirectSound3D"); </span><span class="codeKeyword">if</span><span class="codeNormal"> (Device == NULL) ** exit(-1);</span></p><p class="codeComment"><span class="codeComment">//Create context(s) </span><span class="codeNormal">Context=alcCreateContext(Device , NULL); </span><span class="codeComment">//Set active context </span><span class="codeNormal">alcMakeContextCurrent(Context); </span><span class="codeComment">// Clear Error Code </span><span class="codeNormal">alGetError();</span></p> Loading Sounds</p> Once OpenAL has been initialized you can start filling buffers with sounds. The first step is to fill a buffer with sound using the <span class="codeNormal">alutLoadWAVFile</span> function. Once you have filled the buffer you need to attach it to a source. This source can then be used to play back the sound. The code for loading a sound looks like this:</p> <span class="codeKeyword">char</span><span class="codeNormal">* alBuffer;** ***</span><span class="codeComment">//data for the buffer</span><span class="codeNormal"> ALenum alFormatBuffer; </span><span class="codeComment">//for the buffer format</span> <span class="codeNormal">ALsizei alFreqBuffer;* </span><span class="codeComment">//for the frequency of the buffer</span><span class="codeNormal"></span> <span class="codeKeyword">long </span><span class="codeNormal">alBufferLen;***** </span><span class="codeComment">//the bit depth</span><span class="codeNormal"> ALboolean alLoop;***** </span><span class="codeComment">//looped</span> <span class="codeNormal"></span><span class="codeKeyword">unsigned int</span><span class="codeNormal"> alSource; </span><span class="codeComment">//buffer source</span><span class="codeNormal"> </span><span class="codeKeyword">unsigned int</span><span class="codeNormal"> alSampleSet; </span></p> <span class="codeComment">//load the wave file </span><span class="codeNormal">alutLoadWAVFile("test.wav",&alF ormatBuffer, (</span><span class="codeKeyword">void</span><span class="codeNormal">) &alBuffer,(</span><span class="codeKeyword">unsigned int</span><span class="codeNormal"> )&alBufferLen, &alFreqBuffer, &loop); </span><span class="codeComment">//create 1 source </span><span class="codeNormal">alGenSources(1, &alSource); </span><span class="codeComment">//create 1 buffer </span><span class="codeNormal">alGenBuffers(1, &alSampleSet); </span><span class="codeComment">//fills sample set with buffer data from alBuffer </span><span class="codeNormal">alBufferData(alSampleSet, alFormatBuffer, alBuffer, alBufferLen, alFreqBuffer); </span><span class="codeComment">//assign the buffer to this source </span><span class="codeNormal">alSourcei(alSource, AL_BUFFER, alSampleSet); </span><span class="codeComment">//release the data </span><span class="codeNormal">alutUnloadWAV(alFormatBuffer, alBuffer, alBufferLen, alFreqBuffer);</span></p> The first step here was to load the file "<span class="codeNormal">test.wav</span>". The data is read in and stored in <span class="codeNormal">alBuffer</span>. Next a source and a buffer are created. Then the buffer is filled with data from<span class="codeNormal">alBuffer</span>. Next the buffer is assigned to the source and the wave data is released.</p> Setting Source Properties</p>* Once you have a sound source set up you will need to set some of its properties. To do this you use the <span class="codeNormal">alSource</span> command. This function works similar to functions in OpenGL where different versions of the function exist such as <span class="codeNormal">alSourcei</span>,<span class="codeNormal">alSourcef</span>, <span class="codeNormal">alSource3f</span>, and so on. The properties you are setting determine which function you use. Setting something like pitch for example just needs one floating point parameter so <span class="codeNormal">alSourcef</span> is used. The first parameter passed to the function is that of the source you are modifying. The second parameter corresponds to what property you are changing. The rest of the parameters are the actual settings for this property. Here is an example of setting position and velocity for a sound source:</p> <span class="codeComment">//set source position</span> <span class="codeNormal">alSource3f(alSource,AL_POSITION , xposition, yposition, zposition); </span><span class="codeComment">//set source velocity </span><span class="codeNormal">alSource3f(alSource,AL_VELOCITY , xvelocity, yvelocity, zvelocity);</span></p> Here <span class="codeNormal">alSource</span> is our sound source and<span class="codeNormal">AL_POSITION</span> and <span class="codeNormal">AL_VELOCITY</span> signal that we want to change the position and velocity parameters. The rest correspond to floating point numbers with preset values.</p> Using a Listener</p> The use of a listener in 3D sound is important so that you have a reference point from which to hear sounds. The closer a listener is to a sound source's position, the louder the sound will get provided there are no obstacles. OpenAL already has a listener object set up so all you need to do is modify its properties as needed. The most important properties of the listener are the position and orientation of the listener. These properties are generally updated once for every loop in a game. The position indicates where the listener currently is while the orientation is where the listener is facing. For example, if a listener is facing west and a sound is coming from the north, the sound will appear to come from the right. However if the user orientation changes and turns to face the north, the sound will now appear to come from straight ahead.</p> Modifying a listener's properties works similarly to the way you change a sound source's properties. The function <span class="codeNormal">alListener</span> is used and has variations depending on the property you are modifying. For example, to set the listener position you can call alListener3f and specify 3 separate floating point numbers or you could call <span class="codeNormal">alListenerfv</span> and pass an array of floating point numbers. The parameters for the position are simply the x, y and z values for the listener in the game world. The orientation property however takes 6 parameters. The first 3 are for the vector that corresponds to what the user of listener is currently looking at. The next 3 are for the vector leading straight up from where the listener is facing. Here is an example of setting the listener position and orientation:</p> <span class="codeKeyword">float</span><span class="codeNormal"> listenerx, listenery, listenerz; </span><span class="codeKeyword">float</span><span class="codeNormal"> vec[6]; listenerx=10.0f; listenery=0.0f; listenerz=5.0f; vec[0] = fvecx; </span><span class="codeComment">//forward vector x value</span><span class="codeNormal"> vec[1] = fvecy; </span><span class="codeComment">//forward vector y value</span><span class="codeNormal"> vec[2] = fvecz; </span><span class="codeComment">//forward vector z value</span><span class="codeNormal"> vec[3] = uvecx; </span><span class="codeComment">//up vector x value</span><span class="codeNormal"> vec[4] = uvecy; </span><span class="codeComment">//up vector y value</span><span class="codeNormal"> vec[5] = uvecz; </span><span class="codeComment">//up vector z value</span></p> <span class="codeComment">//set current listener position </span><span class="codeNormal">alListener3f(AL_POSITION, listenerx, listenery, listenerz); </span><span class="codeComment">//set current listener orientation </span><span class="codeNormal">alListenerfv(AL_ORIENTATION, vec);</span></p> In the first function call, 3 separate floating point numbers were passed for the x, y and z of the listener's position. For the second call, an array called <span class="codeNormal">vec</span> is passed. This array is comprised of the six values for the two vectors dealing with the listener's orientation.</p> Playing Sounds</p> Once your sounds are loaded and you have set your listener properties you can then play your sounds. To do this you call the function <span class="codeNormal">alSourcePlay</span>. This function takes a single parameter which is the source you want to play. To stop a sound you call the function <span class="codeNormal">alSourceStop</span> which also takes the name of the source you want to stop. If you want your sound effect to loop such as if you have a sound of running water, you can set the looping property of the sound to true before playing the sound. Here is some sample code:</p> <span class="codeComment">//tell the sound to loop continuously </span><span class="codeNormal">alSourcei(alSource,AL_LOOPING,A L_TRUE); </span><span class="codeComment">//play the sound </span><span class="codeNormal">alSourcePlay(alSource);</span></p> To stop the sound:</p> <span class="codeNormal">alSourceStop(alSource);</span></p> Cleaning Up</p> Once you are finished with your program you need to free up your sources and buffers and shut down OpenAL. The commands are relatively simple. Here is how to delete your sources and buffers:</p> <span class="codeComment">//delete our source</span><span class="codeNormal"> alDeleteSources(1,&alSource);</span> <span class="codeComment">//delete our buffer</span><span class="codeNormal"> alDeleteBuffers(1,&alSampleSet);</span></p> Here the first parameter for each is the number of buffers or sources to be deleted and the second is the buffer or source to be deleted. The last step is to close out OpenAL itself. This is done as follows:</p> <span class="codeComment">//Get active context</span> <span class="codeNormal">Context=alcGetCurrentContext(); </span> <span class="codeComment">//Get device for active context</span> <span class="codeNormal">Device=alcGetContextsDevice(Con text);</span> <span class="codeComment">//Disable context</span> <span class="codeNormal">alcMakeContextCurrent(NULL);</span> <span class="codeComment">//Release context(s)</span> <span class="codeNormal">alcDestroyContext(Context);</span> <span class="codeComment">//Close device</span> <span class="codeNormal">alcCloseDevice(Device);</span></p> That's about it for playing basic sounds in OpenAL. The basic steps are to first initialize OpenAL, then load in whatever sounds you need, set the properties of the sounds and listener and then play the sounds. There is a lot more you can do with OpenAL but this was just written to describe some of the basics. The source code that comes along with this demonstrates the use of all of this in an OpenGL demo. In the demo, you control the listener and its position is set to your current position every loop. If you have any questions or comments, e-mail me at ricart3@tcnj.edu</p> Download the sample application here.</p> </html>

06-08-2003, 02:32 AM	#2
baldurk DevMaster Staff Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Mars Posts: 1,141	wow! Cool man . You might want to check your code-highlighting font tags though ;P ___________________________________________ baldurk He who knows not and knows that he knows not is ignorant. Teach him. He who knows not and knows not that he knows not is a fool. Shun him.

06-08-2003, 07:42 AM	#3
Noor Senior Member Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: ON, Canada Posts: 524	cardinals33: Great Job.... Thank you so much ___________________________________________ "What ever happened to happily ever after?"

06-08-2003, 02:07 PM	#5
davepermen Senior Member Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Switzerland Posts: 1,333	looks very nice. i'll read it more carefully when i have time now its soon utopia-time!! yeah!! ___________________________________________ davepermen.net -Loving a Person is having the wish to see this Person happy, no matter what that means to yourself. -No matter what it means to myself....

06-08-2003, 02:48 PM	#6
stodge Valued Member Join Date: May 2003 Location: Canada Posts: 111	Great article! Nice and concise and easy to read. This will come in handy if I decide to use OpenAL instead of SDL_Mixer. Thanks ___________________________________________ http://stodge.blogspot.com

06-08-2003, 12:48 PM	#4
cardinals33 New Member Join Date: May 2003 Posts: 2	Thanks for the support guys. Hope people can make use of some of the code. If people have ideas for other articles I wouldn't mind writing some more. I was thinking of doing one on EAX and doing 3D sound without OpenAL. I've also done some work streaming Ogg Vorbis files with DirectSound.

06-08-2003, 11:03 PM	#7
donBerto Senior Member Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: East Coast, USA Posts: 370	stodge: ditto dave: utopia, your second home? thanks! great article, great read. ___________________________________________ Imagine.

06-09-2003, 09:15 AM	#8
DarkLight Member Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: HellCity Posts: 57	Great article, cardinals33! ___________________________________________ <a href='http://www.kaldata.net' target='_blank'>kaldata.net - IT News</a>

06-09-2003, 12:14 PM	#9
stodge Valued Member Join Date: May 2003 Location: Canada Posts: 111	A simple 3D sound tutorial using something like SDL_Mixer would certainly be interesting. It would provide a nice comparison with OpenAL and help people choose between the two. ___________________________________________ http://stodge.blogspot.com

06-09-2003, 05:13 PM	#10
Dia Kharrat DevMaster Staff Join Date: Jan 2003 Posts: 1,201	That's a very good idea stodge...Anyone would like to volunteer for doing an article about SDL_Mixer ?

06-10-2003, 12:44 PM	#12
donBerto Senior Member Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: East Coast, USA Posts: 370	haha nice! still, I'm surprised you're still able to find time to post! ___________________________________________ Imagine.

06-10-2003, 10:15 PM	#13
davepermen Senior Member Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Switzerland Posts: 1,333	just don't say it to my boss lalala. no, really. at home i have currently about _NO_ time.. hehe. but the project of me gets bigger and bigger (in brain). just need time and energy to code it down.. it will revolutionize the world. this one at least definitely.. or gets noted in some newspapers, what ever. and no, i don't plan yata (yet another terroristic attack ). its just a sweet looking program ___________________________________________ davepermen.net -Loving a Person is having the wish to see this Person happy, no matter what that means to yourself. -No matter what it means to myself....

06-10-2003, 10:17 PM	#14
davepermen Senior Member Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Switzerland Posts: 1,333	it can even be useful for sound... (to get back on the topic).. while too slow today.. one day... we don't know yet.. sound lacks global reflections and all that as well at least.. a current problem of it.. same as we only have direct lighting realtime today, we have only direct "sounding" realtime today.. well, the future's bright, hehe ___________________________________________ davepermen.net -Loving a Person is having the wish to see this Person happy, no matter what that means to yourself. -No matter what it means to myself....

06-11-2003, 07:48 AM	#15
donBerto Senior Member Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: East Coast, USA Posts: 370	yeah sorry for hijacking this thread :nervous: but yes, it would definitely be interesting to see a side-by-side comparison of OpenAL v SDL_mixer. ___________________________________________ Imagine.

08-23-2003, 08:22 AM	#16
fletcher New Member Join Date: Aug 2003 Posts: 1	Does anyone have a link to discussion or graphics to illustrate INNER_ and OUTER_CONE_ANGLE ??

08-24-2003, 02:22 AM	#17
baldurk DevMaster Staff Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Mars Posts: 1,141	I don't want to start the necromancy argument again, but did that really have to be posted here? I mean, I personally would have started a new thread. ___________________________________________ baldurk He who knows not and knows that he knows not is ignorant. Teach him. He who knows not and knows not that he knows not is a fool. Shun him.

08-24-2003, 05:07 AM	#18
davepermen Senior Member Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Switzerland Posts: 1,333	this time, i'll agree with you ___________________________________________ davepermen.net -Loving a Person is having the wish to see this Person happy, no matter what that means to yourself. -No matter what it means to myself....

08-24-2003, 11:38 AM	#19
baldurk DevMaster Staff Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Mars Posts: 1,141	now maybe you can see why necromancy can be bad ;P ___________________________________________ baldurk He who knows not and knows that he knows not is ignorant. Teach him. He who knows not and knows not that he knows not is a fool. Shun him.

10-13-2003, 07:00 PM	#20
i2eye New Member Join Date: Oct 2003 Posts: 4	Hi, I'm a newbie in this openAL world, just checking out how this example works... But I got stuck in getting these compiling errors: Compiling... alsound.cpp dinput.cpp e:\geewoo\project\openal\openaltut\dinput.cpp(9) : error C2146: syntax error : missing ';' before identifier 'g_DI' e:\geewoo\project\openal\openaltut\dinput.cpp(9) : error C2501: 'LPDIRECTINPUT8' : missing storage-class or type specifiers e:\geewoo\project\openal\openaltut\dinput.cpp(9) : fatal error C1004: unexpected end of file found main.cpp e:\geewoo\project\openal\openaltut\main.cpp(24) : error C2146: syntax error : missing ';' before identifier 'g_KDIDev' e:\geewoo\project\openal\openaltut\main.cpp(24) : fatal error C1004: unexpected end of file found Error executing cl.exe. openaltest.exe - 5 error(s), 0 warning(s) I didn't make any changes in the source code. Does anybody have an idea what's wrong with this? I think I've linked all the library files needed...

10-14-2003, 02:49 AM	#21
baldurk DevMaster Staff Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Mars Posts: 1,141	this is just a guess, but I'd say you're not including a header you need. Looks like a DX one, but I couldn't say for sure. ___________________________________________ baldurk He who knows not and knows that he knows not is ignorant. Teach him. He who knows not and knows not that he knows not is a fool. Shun him.

10-15-2003, 01:26 AM	#22
i2eye New Member Join Date: Oct 2003 Posts: 4	Well, I don't really know what happened actually, but it got to work somehow. I figured out something was wrong with my computer, because it had problems with openGL & DirectX sources also. So I just re-installed everything(starting from win2k...). Thank you anyway.

10-28-2004, 11:00 PM	#23
yjh1982 New Member Join Date: Oct 2004 Posts: 2	bug openal is GPL lisence. is mean your program must GPL? I am not like GPL;BSD or zlib is greater.

10-29-2004, 12:55 AM	#24
SpreeTree Valued Member Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: England Posts: 265	No, if you use OpenAL your final program doesnt need to be GPL based. If that was the case then big companies out there wouldnt use it e.g. Epic Games. Spree

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