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Why is Vulcan so magical that everyone in this thread thinks it is the only choice?

erikpukinskis 10y ago
It has three things going for it: 1) It's currently the fastest (unlike DirectX) 2) It's not controlled by an OS company (unlike DirectX and Metal) 3) It reflects recent developer and hardware concerns (unlike OpenGL)
- MBCook 10y ago
  1) Compared to Metal or the low level thing MS has (don't they have one?) 2) Apple is proposing an open standard here, they're not making WebMetal 3) Why do you think Apple's proposal doesn't?
  - dkersten 10y ago
    1) The low level thing MS has is DirectX 12. I saw some benchmarks across multiple graphics cards that showed it was slower than Vulkan, but I can't seem to find it now... so its unclear to me if it is or isn't slower. 2) I think the people here would rather it be developed by an independent group like Khronos Group. For example, Apple created OpenCL as an open standard too and then abandoned it.
    - MBCook 10y ago
      On one, ok. I haven't followed DirectX too closely. I knew 12 was designed to match modern GPUs much closer but I didn't know if that was sort of 'medium' between DX 11 and Vulcan, there being something even lower from MS. Thanks.
      - dkersten 10y ago
        Im sure it was probably just early drivers and its faster now (or at least getting faster).
- UnoriginalGuy 10y ago
  And does it make security assurances making it suitable to expose to the web? I know a bit about DirectX and OpenGL, and I wouldn't expose a direct interface to either of them on the web. Does Vulcan make security and isolation assurances? If not then it is useless.
  - erikpukinskis 10y ago
    Obviously there has to be a ground up rethink with security in mind. The standard won't be the same API, just like WebGL isn't the same as OpenGL. It's just, where it's possible to, you use the same API. The point is why not start with a starting point you can use on potentially every platform? There's no way Apple would ever allow Metal proper to be ported to PlayStation or Windows, so you're limiting yourself to at best two platform coverage targeting this new standard. Vulcan will, hopefully, work on every platform. At least subsets of it, with shims. No way Metal ever gets there.
  - vetinari 10y ago
    Vulkan has validation layers - that are transparent to both app using the API on one side and to the driver on the other end.
eddieh 10y ago
Your question seems rhetorical, but here are my thoughts anyway... This is the new normal, coinciding with the death of expertise. The WebKit developers clearly are not working in a vacuum, if one bothers to read the blog post: > Our proposal has been received positively by our colleagues at other browser engines, GPU vendors, and framework developers. Not to mention that the WebKit developers are pretty much the forefathers of all modern web tech. So the WebKit developers and their colleagues are the experts. And the expert consensus is the successor to WebGL will be something new, something that can be implemented in DirectX 12+, Metal, and Vulkan. But all the non-experts have heard of Vulkan, and are armed with the simplistic notion that Vulkan is the "next generation of OpenGL". They erroneously conclude that WebGL's successor must also be a Vulkan based solution. The non-experts will justify this belief with all manner of ridiculous conspiracy-esque conclusions to reinforce their bias. Like "Apple is trying to force the standard", "Apple wasted their time developing Metal", "Apple is a closed-source walled garden", "Apple is expensive". All of which is is essentially the tech version of "libtard" based arguments. RIP expertise.
- zamalek 10y ago
  > WebKit developers are pretty much the forefathers of all modern web tech. IE4 was the forefather of modern web tech[1]. > They erroneously conclude that WebGL's successor must also be a Vulkan based solution. [...] All of which is is essentially the tech version of "libtard" based arguments. No, people are sick of working against 3 different APIs. One of which is a standard. It's Microsoft doing their own thing with IE all over again. A safe subset of Vulkan would be familiar and would have existing documentation. All designed by GPU experts. [1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamic_HTML https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamic_HTML
  - eddieh 10y ago
    Except, as I quoted, the GPU experts and the other browser vendors are onboard with this. This isn't Apple going at it alone like MS did. You're reenforcing my point. Thank you for that.
    - 10y ago
hornetblack 10y ago
The WebGPU code there looks a lot like vulkan. Just no big struct's or vk prefixes.

It has three things going for it: 1) It's currently the fastest (unlike DirectX) 2) It's not controlled by an OS company (unlike DirectX and Metal) 3) It reflects recent developer and hardware concerns (unlike OpenGL)

MBCook 10y ago
1) Compared to Metal or the low level thing MS has (don't they have one?) 2) Apple is proposing an open standard here, they're not making WebMetal 3) Why do you think Apple's proposal doesn't?
- dkersten 10y ago
  1) The low level thing MS has is DirectX 12. I saw some benchmarks across multiple graphics cards that showed it was slower than Vulkan, but I can't seem to find it now... so its unclear to me if it is or isn't slower. 2) I think the people here would rather it be developed by an independent group like Khronos Group. For example, Apple created OpenCL as an open standard too and then abandoned it.
  - MBCook 10y ago
    On one, ok. I haven't followed DirectX too closely. I knew 12 was designed to match modern GPUs much closer but I didn't know if that was sort of 'medium' between DX 11 and Vulcan, there being something even lower from MS. Thanks.
    - dkersten 10y ago
      Im sure it was probably just early drivers and its faster now (or at least getting faster).
UnoriginalGuy 10y ago
And does it make security assurances making it suitable to expose to the web? I know a bit about DirectX and OpenGL, and I wouldn't expose a direct interface to either of them on the web. Does Vulcan make security and isolation assurances? If not then it is useless.
- erikpukinskis 10y ago
  Obviously there has to be a ground up rethink with security in mind. The standard won't be the same API, just like WebGL isn't the same as OpenGL. It's just, where it's possible to, you use the same API. The point is why not start with a starting point you can use on potentially every platform? There's no way Apple would ever allow Metal proper to be ported to PlayStation or Windows, so you're limiting yourself to at best two platform coverage targeting this new standard. Vulcan will, hopefully, work on every platform. At least subsets of it, with shims. No way Metal ever gets there.
- vetinari 10y ago
  Vulkan has validation layers - that are transparent to both app using the API on one side and to the driver on the other end.

eddieh 10y ago

Your question seems rhetorical, but here are my thoughts anyway... This is the new normal, coinciding with the death of expertise. The WebKit developers clearly are not working in a vacuum, if one bothers to read the blog post: > Our proposal has been received positively by our colleagues at other browser engines, GPU vendors, and framework developers. Not to mention that the WebKit developers are pretty much the forefathers of all modern web tech. So the WebKit developers and their colleagues are the experts. And the expert consensus is the successor to WebGL will be something new, something that can be implemented in DirectX 12+, Metal, and Vulkan. But all the non-experts have heard of Vulkan, and are armed with the simplistic notion that Vulkan is the "next generation of OpenGL". They erroneously conclude that WebGL's successor must also be a Vulkan based solution. The non-experts will justify this belief with all manner of ridiculous conspiracy-esque conclusions to reinforce their bias. Like "Apple is trying to force the standard", "Apple wasted their time developing Metal", "Apple is a closed-source walled garden", "Apple is expensive". All of which is is essentially the tech version of "libtard" based arguments. RIP expertise.

zamalek 10y ago
> WebKit developers are pretty much the forefathers of all modern web tech. IE4 was the forefather of modern web tech[1]. > They erroneously conclude that WebGL's successor must also be a Vulkan based solution. [...] All of which is is essentially the tech version of "libtard" based arguments. No, people are sick of working against 3 different APIs. One of which is a standard. It's Microsoft doing their own thing with IE all over again. A safe subset of Vulkan would be familiar and would have existing documentation. All designed by GPU experts. [1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamic_HTML https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamic_HTML
- eddieh 10y ago
  Except, as I quoted, the GPU experts and the other browser vendors are onboard with this. This isn't Apple going at it alone like MS did. You're reenforcing my point. Thank you for that.
  - 10y ago

hornetblack 10y ago

The WebGPU code there looks a lot like vulkan. Just no big struct's or vk prefixes.