Chemists criticise mooted shutdown of 3D visualisation tools
End of support for Apple’s OpenGL programming interface could pull the plug on molecular modelling software
Researchers are voicing concerns over a move that may affect many 3D visualisation programs that are commonly used in computational research.
Apple’s Macintosh operating systems (macOS) is planning to end support for OpenGL, the programming interface frequently used to display 3D graphics in medical and scientific visualisation software, which has existed since 1992. Nearly all open source and commercial chemistry visualisation programs that are used to display atoms, molecules, bonds and protein ribbons – such as Mercury, VMD and PyMOL – use the system.