International Business Machines Corporation

Douglas P Moore

David C Tannenbaum

Roland M Hochmuth

A method and system for processing a graphics data stream in a computer graphics system having a parallel processing system. The graphics data stream includes a plurality of elements. The method and system of the present invention involve associating tags with elements in a graphics data stream, wherein each tag indicates a display order for the element associated with the tag. The elements are processed within a parallel processing system to produce processed elements, wherein each of the processed elements maintains an association with a tag. The processed elements are rasterized in a selected sequence to determine new pixel data sets, wherein rasterization of each processed element results in a new pixel data set for each of a plurality of pixels. Each new pixel data set includes order data derived from a tag associated with each of the processed elements. For each new pixel data set resulting from the rasterization of the processed elements, a current pixel data set is determined in response to a comparison of order data in the new pixel data set with order data in an existing pixel data set for each of the pixels. The pixels are then displayed within a display device utilizing the current pixel data sets associated with each of the pixels, wherein the plurality of elements is displayed in an order indicated by the associated tags to form a image.

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Kingston, NY, United States of America

Douglas P Moore