Vulkan – Graphics and computing belong together
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Re: Vulkan – Graphics and computing belong together
#2I had a long debate on multiple forums recently regarding the almost uselessness of OpenGL in presence of something like OpenCL, especially when OpenGL does its job (as a graphics library) in a very crappy manner by trying to be part-framework, part-library, and not doing either properly, and making the life of a graphics programmer a living hell, who has to code 80% of the graphics pipeline by hand or using third party matrix libraries anyway. I realized this very strongly when I considered doing graphics using OpenGL but with a photorealistic renderer like a path tracer.
Currently the only reason for OpenGL over GPU being inevitable is that GPU vendors don't provide access to "non-GPGPU" parts (like TMU, ROP) directly to OpenCL (or CUDA), which is clearly a matter of design rather then technicality.
Unsurprisingly, people were offended or upset (you either don't use OpenGL, or you end up defending it against criticism, subconsciously, because you have invested so much time learning it).
I hope something good comes out of this initiative.
Re: Vulkan – Graphics and computing belong together
#3Direct access to the GPU...is that done in some kind of sandbox at least? How do Mantle/Metal/DX12 do it?
Re: Vulkan – Graphics and computing belong together
#4I noticed the very significant working group members at the bottom of the page. If that is nearly as good as it looks, I'm very hopeful.
Here is the press release: https://www.khronos.org/news/press/khronos-reveals-vulkan-ap...
It seems Valve will work hard on it:
“Industry standard APIs like Vulkan are a critical part of enabling developers to bring the best possible experience to customers on multiple platforms,” said Valve’s Gabe Newell. “Valve and the other Khronos members are working hard to ensure that this high-performance graphics interface is made available as widely as possible and we view it as a critical component of SteamOS and future Valve games.”
Technical previews will be shown at GDC this week.
Re: Vulkan – Graphics and computing belong together
#5I had a long debate on multiple forums recently regarding the almost uselessness of OpenGL in presence of something like OpenCL, especially when OpenGL does its job (as a graphics library) in a very crappy manner by trying to be part-framework, part-library, and not doing either properly, and making the life of a graphics programmer a living hell, who has to code 80% of the graphics pipeline by hand or using third pa…
I've spent 15 years working on OpenGL, but I'd kick it to the kerb in a heartbeat.
AMD and NVIDIA are free to implement Vulkan on Windows and Linux, but the problem is that we will probably be stuck with OpenGL 4.0 on Mac OS X for the foreseeable future.
Re: Vulkan – Graphics and computing belong together
#6So it looks like this is the Khronos answer to Mantle/Metal. Does anyone have a quick summary comparing the three? Is Vulkan just targeting game developers or is there a wider set of use cases they want to hit? Is there any current guess about when hardware/software support will come? Can we expect a WebVulkan sometime before 2025?
Re: Vulkan – Graphics and computing belong together
#7So it looks like this is the Khronos answer to Mantle/Metal. Does anyone have a quick summary comparing the three? Is Vulkan just targeting game developers or is there a wider set of use cases they want to hit? Is there any current guess about when hardware/software support will come? Can we expect a WebVulkan sometime before 2025?
Vulkan is the evolution of Mantle (get it... get it :)) ?) AMD contributed a lot to the development of this API and then collaborated with Microsoft to create DX12. Mantle will remain as a testbed of future technologies
Re: Vulkan – Graphics and computing belong together
#8I noticed the very significant working group members at the bottom of the page. If that is nearly as good as it looks, I'm very hopeful. Here is the press release: https://www.khronos.org/news/press/khronos-reveals-vulkan-ap... It seems Valve will work hard on it: “Industry standard APIs like Vulkan are a critical part of enabling developers to bring the best possible experience to customers on multiple platforms,” s…
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Re: Vulkan – Graphics and computing belong together
#9Direct access to the GPU...is that done in some kind of sandbox at least? How do Mantle/Metal/DX12 do it?
I'm unaware of Mantle and Metal, but DirectX is direct too.
It's not really a massive issue when you're locally installing programs since you've already compromised your system in the first place. But when leveraged over the web with APIs such as WebGL, it does become a security vulnerability.
Re: Vulkan – Graphics and computing belong together
#10So it looks like this is the Khronos answer to Mantle/Metal. Does anyone have a quick summary comparing the three? Is Vulkan just targeting game developers or is there a wider set of use cases they want to hit? Is there any current guess about when hardware/software support will come? Can we expect a WebVulkan sometime before 2025?
Vulkan is the evolution of Mantle (get it... get it :)) ?) AMD contributed a lot to the development of this API and then collaborated with Microsoft to create DX12. Mantle will remain as a testbed of future technologies
I get that AMD wants this because it will make CPU performance less important for gamers, as they can't currently compete against Intel here. AMDs APU concept would become more attractive that way.
Valve etc. want this because OpenGL sucks, but DX is Win only.
Microsoft will want to defend its DX stronghold - can they, on a technical level? Will Nvidia play along?