

Before DirectX, games for the PC were written in DOS in order to redraw the screen fast enough for real-time animation. The first DirectX API was introduced in late 1995 to encourage game developers to move their software to Windows. DirectX provides a high-level interface for accessing low-level functions "directly." It accesses the hardware abstraction layer in Windows (see HAL).

Windows developers program to the DirectX APIs, and the manufacturers of sound and graphics cards write DirectX drivers to be included with their hardware. This article is provided by FOLDOC - Free Online Dictionary of Computing ( ) DirectXA set of Windows interfaces from Microsoft for programming graphics and sound.
