Graphics Animation System for Professionals: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 01:20, 22 June 2017

Revision as of 17:59, 8 September 2017

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{{Refimprove|date=July 2016}}

{{Merge from|GLPro|date=April 2015}}

{{Infobox Software

| name = GRASP

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In 1994, GRASP development stopped when John Bridges terminated his publishing contract with Paul Mace Software. In 1995, John created [[GLPro]] for [[IMS Communications Ltd]], the newest incarnation of John's ideas behind GRASP updated for [[Microsoft Windows|Windows]]. In 2002, John Bridges created [[AfterGRASP]], a successor to GRASP and GLPro.

==GLPro==

'''GLPro''' was a multimedia authoring application for [[MS-DOS]] and [[Microsoft Windows]]. GLPro is a contraction of Graphics Language Professional, and was written by [[John Bridges (software developer)|John Bridges]] as a successor to GRASP. Windows support in GLPro was released in the summer of 1996.

Unlike competing technologies such as [[Macromedia Director]], GLPro took a very minimalist approach, providing an extensive scripting language rather than a lot of [[WYSIWYG]] tools within a Graphical User Interface. Everything was accomplished by writing code using its [[BASIC programming language|BASIC]]-like syntax. The scripting language was not [[Object-oriented programming|object oriented]], and as a result consists of a very large number of specialised commands. The programmer was not able to create new classes or extend the language. It has been criticised for its syntactical inconsistency, steep learning curve, and the fact that it does not deliver a cross-platform multimedia solution. Despite this it has been enthusiastically received by numbers of users, many dating back to the early [[GRASP (multimedia authoring software)|GRASP]] under [[MS-DOS]] days.

An unusual design philosophy behind GLPro is that it does not rely on external OS services to handle many media types, such as [[MP3]] audio, [[MPEG]] video, etc. Instead it contains its own player code. The thinking is that by avoiding OS services for these tasks, the end user is spared the problem of needing to install additional components before being able to run a multimedia title on their machine - it is intended to "just work". Although an advantage for some standalone projects, this philosophy suffered from an inability to keep up with new media developments.

GLPro was moved into a separate company, [[GMedia]], in early 2000, which closed their doors in February 2001 just as the native [[Apple Macintosh|Macintosh]] and [[Linux]] support was entering public beta testing. Bridges is no longer involved in its development, and as of February 2002 is developing a new multimedia authoring system called [[AfterGRASP]] designed to be backwards compatible with GLPro with less emphasis on built-in media playback support.

GLPro is currently owned by [http://www.comlettechnologies.com Comlet Technologies, LLC.] and is one of the primary languages used in its [http://www.comlets.com Comlets Message System] product.

==See also==

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==References==

{{Reflist|30em}}

==Bibliography for GLPro==

* [http://www.concept-usa.us/glpro/glprolist/glprolist.asp?as_q=History+of+GLPRO GLPro Mailing List Archive]

* [https://web.archive.org/web/20010625001824/http://www.gmedia.com/glpro/press/history.html GLPro History]

*The Graphics File Formats Page

:GL - Another animation format

:Dr. Martin Reddy

:Technical Lead, R & D, Pixar Animation Studios

:http://www.martinreddy.net/gfx/2d/GL.txt

==External links==