Glass and Mirrors - General Glass Questions

Just moved from condo to first house. Have a couple of questions about glass.

1. Shower has sort of a clearstory window with a heavily textured glass surface. Upon returning home from work the second day after moving in, I discovered a golf ball had been drive through my window. Nobody confessed (actually I have not even met any of my neighbors yet), so I'm just going to get it replaced myself. I like the look of frosted (sandblasted?) glass. Is there any advantage of one over the other?

2. I have several sliding glass patio doors. Should I ever have to replace any glass, does the glass have to be tempered or laminated? In general, what are the partictular applications (around the home) where each type would be used?

Thanks.

Frosted glass is usually textured where as sandblasted glass is fairly smooth. They both obscure vision while allowing light in.

The patio doors probably have double pane (insulating) glass which by law must be tempered. If they break, you must purchased the sealed glass unit from a glass shop. Laminated glass is rarely used for this application since it is more costly but does have the advantage that the glass will remain intact in the frame if broken whereas tempered glass breaks into small beads and falls out of the frame.