al_flip_display(3)

💖 NAME 💖

al_flip_display — Allegro 5 API. This is the al_flip_display(3) page from the Library Functions Manual, and bestie, she's iconic for getting your graphics onto the screen ✨💅

✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

#include <allegro5/allegro.h>

void al_flip_display(void)

🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

Okay so what she does: she copies or updates the front and back buffers so that what has been drawn previously on the currently selected display becomes visible on screen. That's literally her whole main-character job 💖

Pointers to the special back buffer bitmap remain valid and retain their semantics as the back buffer, although the contents may have changed. So don't panic, bestie — the pointer is still valid, even if the pixels said "new phone who dis" 👑

Note: if you are not using the ALLEGRO_SINGLE_BUFFER option, you typically want to redraw every pixel of the backbuffer bitmap to avoid uninitialized memory artifacts. fr fr, don't leave uninitialized memory crumbs 🍓

Several display options change how this function behaves:

• With ALLEGRO_SINGLE_BUFFER, no flipping is done. You still have to call this function to display graphics, depending on how the used graphics system works. lowkey weird but that's the vibe ✨
• The ALLEGRO_SWAP_METHOD option may have additional information about what kind of operation is used internally to flip the front and back buffers. iykyk 🔍
• If ALLEGRO_VSYNC is 1, this function will force waiting for vsync. If ALLEGRO_VSYNC is 2, this function will not wait for vsync. With many drivers the vsync behavior is controlled by the user and not the application, and ALLEGRO_VSYNC will not be set; in this case al_flip_display(3) will wait for vsync depending on the settings set in the system's graphics preferences. so yeah, vsync said "it's complicated" 😭

🌈 SEE ALSO 🌈

• al_set_new_display_flags(3)
• al_set_new_display_option(3)

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source/version: Allegro reference manual · date: not listed, bestie 🫶🎀

💜 that's the page, slay 💜