We'll now describe in detail what functions are specific to buffers and windows in Panda.

GraphicsBuffer and ParasiteBuffer

Use these if you want to do off-screen rendering. You must pass True when you create it if you want to get a texture from it. Otherwise, there is no difference in functionality than a GraphicsOutput.

The only difference between a GraphicsBuffer and a ParasiteBuffer is that a ParasiteBuffer does not create it own framebuffer space. To create a ParasiteBuffer you call makeParasite() from the graphics engine.

makeParasite(host, name,sort, xSize, ySize)

The arguments name, sort, xSize, and ySize mean the same things they mean for makeWindow and makeBuffer. The new argument host is the GraphicsOutput object whose space in memory it will use. Any rendering done to the parasite is done to the same space in memory as its host. The function makeTextureBuffer sometimes returns a ParasiteBuffer for space saving reasons. It is also useful for APIs that don't support offscreen rendering.

ParasiteBuffer objects are automatically setup for calls to getTexture() since their contents get cleared when host draws itself.

GraphicsWindows

Unlike GraphicsBuffer objects GraphicsWindow objects have a lot more functionality than GraphicsOutput objects.

The most basic of these functions is hasKeyboard() and hasPointer() which returns whether or not this window has the focus of keyboard and pointer respectively. Any calls to keyboard or pointer functions when you do not have control of them generates an error.

You can get the number of input devices for this window by using getNumInputDevices(). In the absence of a joystick, etc. there is usually only one input device, the 'keyboard/mouse' device. If the API you are using supports it, you can move a mouse to a certain place in the window by using movePointer(device, x,y) where device is the name of the device that holds the mouse (most probabaly 'keyboard/mouse') and x and y represent the screen position where you want to move the pointer. It returns True if it was succesful, and False otherwise.

You can also ask a window if it isFullscreen() and if it isClosed(). It is important to note that a window is not automatically opened after a call to makeWindow and is not automatically closed after a call to closeWindow.

In order to get the full set of properties for a given window you use the function getProperties(). This returns a WindowProperties object that holds all the information for the given screen. See the API documentation for the full functionality of the WindowProperties class.

If you want to change these properties, use getRequestedProperties() and apply the proper WindowProperties functions.

To run panda3d in full screen, rather than a window, do the following:

wp = WindowProperties() 
wp.setFullscreen(True) 
base.win.requestProperties(wp)

Alternatively, you can modify the fullscreen configuration variable before importing direct.directbase.DirectStart:

from pandac.PandaModules import loadPrcFileData
loadPrcFileData("", """fullscreen 1
win-size 1024 768""")

from direct.showbase.DirectObject import DirectObject   # for event handling 
import direct.directbase.DirectStart 
import sys 

class World(DirectObject): 
   def __init__(self): 
      self.accept("escape",sys.exit) 

w= World() 
run()

If a requested change is not possible or invalid, you can call getRejectedProperties(). It returns a WindowProperties object that holds all of the properties that could not be changed.

Windows can also send Events when the user changes a property of the window. You can get the name of this event by calling getWindowEvent(). Initially, all windows send the same event when changed. If you want to setup events for a certain window, use setWindowEvent(name) where name is the name of the event you want sent when this window gets changed externally.

For more advanced functionality see GraphicsWindow in the API documentation.