# GLFW as buffer or texture debug window inside another OpenGL app?

**URL:** <https://discourse.glfw.org/t/glfw-as-buffer-or-texture-debug-window-inside-another-opengl-app/1172>\
**Category:** support\
**Created:** [September 14, 2018, 5:40pm UTC](https://discourse.glfw.org/t/glfw-as-buffer-or-texture-debug-window-inside-another-opengl-app/1172 "2018-09-14T17:40:11Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![tmacki](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c37758/32.png) [@tmacki](https://discourse.glfw.org/u/tmacki)\
**Post date:** [September 14, 2018, 5:40pm UTC](https://discourse.glfw.org/t/glfw-as-buffer-or-texture-debug-window-inside-another-opengl-app/1172/1 "2018-09-14T17:40:11Z")

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Dear GLFW enthusiasts!

I had an idea to use GLFW as an external debug helper window to display for example depth buffer in it. However I had no luck to run it inside another OpenGL pipeline.

Is it at all possible to keep a GLFW window and display some data in it coming from another OpenGL app? Or will it be to messy to keep GLFW pipeline and that app’s pipeline separate? I’m a bit tired of using glBlitFramebuffer and wish to have my own real-time buffer debug tool.

Thanks!

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**Author:** ![dougbinks](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex035/user_avatar/discourse.glfw.org/dougbinks/32/39_2.png) [@dougbinks](https://discourse.glfw.org/u/dougbinks)\
**Post date:** [September 15, 2018, 8:43am UTC](https://discourse.glfw.org/t/glfw-as-buffer-or-texture-debug-window-inside-another-opengl-app/1172/2 "2018-09-15T08:43:36Z")

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You can share quite a bit of OpenGL state information between OpenGL contexts with shared contexts, however currently [GLFW can only share contexts with other GLFW windows](http://www.glfw.org/docs/latest/context_guide.html#context_sharing) so this would not be possible with a window created using another API.