OpenGLAD

OpenGLAD is a cross-platform Swift Package that wraps GLAD 2, the OpenGL function loader, providing C/Swift interoperability through a Clang module map.

It is designed to be used in conjunction with an external OpenGL context manager such as OpenGLFW.

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Features

• OpenGL function loader generated via GLAD 2
• C/Swift interoperability via module map
• Cross-platform support (Windows, Linux, macOS)
• Generated from GLAD 2.0.8
• Designed for external context management

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Requirements

Tool	Version
Swift	6.0+
OS	macOS 13+, Ubuntu 22.04+, Windows 10+

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Installation

Add the package to your Package.swift:

dependencies: [
    .package(url: "https://github.com/helbertgs/OpenGLAD.git", from: "1.0.0")
],
targets: [
    .target(
        name: "YourTarget",
        dependencies: ["OpenGLAD"]
    )
]

Usage

1. Initialize the loader

Initialize GLAD after an OpenGL context has been created.

import OpenGLAD

gladLoaderLoadGL()

The exact loader function is provided by the generated GLAD 2 sources.

2. Use OpenGL functions

All gl* functions and GL_* constants become available after initialization.

glad_glClearColor(0.2, 0.3, 0.3, 1.0)
glad_glClear(GLenum(GL_COLOR_BUFFER_BIT))
glad_glDrawArrays(GLenum(GL_TRIANGLES), 0, 3)

3. Unload (optional)

Release function pointers before destroying the context.

gladLoaderUnloadGL()

Concurrency

OpenGL requires that all gl* calls are executed on the same thread that owns the active context. In Swift 6 environments, a common pattern is to confine rendering to @MainActor when the context is bound to the main thread:

@MainActor
final class Renderer {
    func setup() {
        gladLoaderLoadGL()
    }

    func render() {
        glClear(GLenum(GL_COLOR_BUFFER_BIT))
    }

    deinit {
        gladLoaderUnloadGL()
    }
}

Project Structure

OpenGLAD
└── Sources
    └── OpenGLAD
        ├── include
        │   ├── module.modulemap
        │   ├── glad
        │   │   ├── gl.h
        │   └── khr
        │       └── khrplatform.h
        │
        └── src
            └── khrplatform.h

License

This package is licensed under the MIT License. The bundled GLAD sources are generated code from GLAD 2 and follow the licensing terms defined by the generator configuration.