Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Show HN: Shadeup – A language that makes WebGPU easier

shadeup.dev

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

1–10 of 57 posts

Re: Show HN: Shadeup – A language that makes WebGPU easier

#3

Post by jrmydev »

MattRix wrote: post #2

Not sure if this page is rendering only via WebGPU or something, but on iOS this is just a blank page.

Yeah, unfortunately, the main background is running webgpu so edge/chrome/opera desktop are the only browsers that can see it.

Here's a screenshot of what it should look like: https://i.imgur.com/CBHaftp.jpg

Re: Show HN: Shadeup – A language that makes WebGPU easier

#4

Post by hyperthesis »

I like https://github.com/evanw/lightgl.js

learnt from https://jamie-wong.com/2016/08/05/webgl-fluid-simulation/#im...

  the elegant lightgl.js, which is an abstraction layer on top of WebGL that makes it much nicer to work with. Unlike THREE.js, it doesn’t make any assumptions about you wanting any concept of a camera or lighting or that you’re working in 3D at all.

Re: Show HN: Shadeup – A language that makes WebGPU easier

#5

Post by stanleykm »

This is really cool. As far as boilerplate goes WebGPU is really not that bad (one just needs to look at Vulkan to see how fun it can get) but really anything to lower the barrier to entry is nice.

I am curious about the API overhead here. For example if I run two separate passes using bare WebGPU I could use a single command encoder. Would two function calls here result in two command encoders?

Another question - from the example code this doesnt look asynchronous, does it wait for everything to finish before returning? I could also be misreading the code I dont know typescript very well.

Re: Show HN: Shadeup – A language that makes WebGPU easier

#6

Post by jrmydev »

stanleykm wrote: post #5

This is really cool. As far as boilerplate goes WebGPU is really not that bad (one just needs to look at Vulkan to see how fun it can get) but really anything to lower the barrier to entry is nice. I am curious about the API overhead here. For example if I run two separate passes using bare WebGPU I could use a single command encoder. Would two function calls here result in two command encoders? Another question - fr…

Thanks, and great question:

Shadeup will try to fit it all into one command encoder but may need to split if the coder: 1. Manually flushes 2. Reads/downloads a buffer on the CPU

Most calls are lazily evaluated, and a small dep graph is built as you reference/draw things.

That being said, shadeup does make some perf sacrifices in the name of simplicity. I'd say it's well suited to prototyping and learning. Of course, once you have a working prototype of something porting it to native wgsl should be easy

Re: Show HN: Shadeup – A language that makes WebGPU easier

#7

Post by paranoidxprod »

jrmydev wrote: post #3
MattRix wrote: post #2

Not sure if this page is rendering only via WebGPU or something, but on iOS this is just a blank page.

Yeah, unfortunately, the main background is running webgpu so edge/chrome/opera desktop are the only browsers that can see it. Here's a screenshot of what it should look like: https://i.imgur.com/CBHaftp.jpg

I just checked on Linux Firefox and iOS Firefox and both loaded the background without issues.

Re: Show HN: Shadeup – A language that makes WebGPU easier

#8

Post by zamadatix »

The particles effect on this page is a great example of "old web" feel in a page with "new web" looks in that it's just so fun and impractical solely because it can be.

The "browse" button towards the bottom has a few editable examples as well, including one for the effect seen on the main page https://shadeup.dev/zv5twftezv2y

Re: Show HN: Shadeup – A language that makes WebGPU easier

#9

Post by jrmydev »

paranoidxprod wrote: post #7
jrmydev wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, unfortunately, the main background is running webgpu so edge/chrome/opera desktop are the only browsers that can see it. Here's a screenshot of what it should look like: https://i.imgur.com/CBHaftp.jpg

I just checked on Linux Firefox and iOS Firefox and both loaded the background without issues.

Hmm, that's probably the static picture fallback you're seeing.

Here's a video of what the particles look like when moving if interested: https://www.loom.com/share/c2608492dce44ab4b84b8fe4c68c44cd?...

Re: Show HN: Shadeup – A language that makes WebGPU easier

#10

Post by pjmlp »

stanleykm wrote: post #5

This is really cool. As far as boilerplate goes WebGPU is really not that bad (one just needs to look at Vulkan to see how fun it can get) but really anything to lower the barrier to entry is nice. I am curious about the API overhead here. For example if I run two separate passes using bare WebGPU I could use a single command encoder. Would two function calls here result in two command encoders? Another question - fr…

WebGPU main pain point is forcing everyone to rewrite their shaders, no wonder most Web native game engines are going the shading language abstraction route, when only Chrome does WebGPU on desktop, and it isn't even an option on mobile years to come.

Thus cross API WebGL / WebGPU shading middleware is needed.

Post reply on HN