4 ms·

And developers love rewriting their graphical backends for every target platform, its the best!

by zanny 9y ago

bronxbomber92 9y ago
In reality, for most developers, it is a non-issue to bringup a new graphics API backend. See, for example, Arseny Kapoulkine's experience porting to Metal: http://zeuxcg.org/2016/12/01/metal-retrospective http://zeuxcg.org/2016/12/01/metal-retrospective
- ioquatix 9y ago
  One example is not most developers. I'm a developer and I get paid to write hardware accelerated renderers and for the past two years I've been recommending Vulkan.. I'm exclusively using Linux these days for software development. Sometimes it's not about what you're targeting for deployment but the capabilities of the development machine. For example, I do like Xcode, but I can't use it for Vulkan development, even if my ultimate platform isn't macOS/Apple. Apple dropped the ball on Vulkan and I do hope they support it eventually.
  - pjmlp 9y ago
    Good luck using Vulkan on the PS, XBox or 93% of Android devices out there.
    - ioquatix 9y ago
      We develop server based hardware-accelerated renderers and compositors for web applications, e.g. dynamically generated product images. None of those targets are relevant. Think ImageMagick but done on hardware + 3D geometry in many cases.
pjmlp 9y ago
Yes they do, just indies and FOSS devs on HN don't. The software development culture on the games industry is to make use of the best way to squeeze the graphics performance of a given piece of hardware until the last drop of juice. This is an industry that was born from rewriting their whole games for each type of gaming platform they wanted to sell games to, in Assembly. In many cases using a dumb hexdump editor connected over a serial cable. Having an abstraction layer over all graphics API is a minor inconvenience that can be easily done in one month. Plus it is something that is only written once for a specific engine.
- shmerl 9y ago
  No, they don't. Because it's not free and wastes their time. You just keep repeating this weird idea, that developers like this balkanized landscape. They don't. No one likes it, except for lock-in freaks who created it to keep cross platform development expensive. > Having an abstraction layer over all graphics API is a minor inconvenience that can be easily done in one month. Quite false. Take a look how long it takes major engines (like Unreal) to implement such abstraction. And how long it takes them to iron out bugs caused by underlying differences. And then try to claim it's a good thing they need to waste all this time. I don't really understand why you personally like this mess.
  - pjmlp 9y ago
    Because I have the experience in the games industry that you lack. Apparently from the votes I sometimes get, others also share my life experience.
    - shmerl 9y ago
      If you have experience, you'd know it's time consuming and taxing. You either like this time wasting, or you benefit from this taxation (working for MS?).
      - pjmlp 9y ago
        Only FOSS devs see it as time consuming and taxing, professional game studios see it as an opportunity to explore hardware performance to the last drop. For anyone with experience in graphics programming, the time to triangle is just like doing hello world or playing fizz buzz. The last time I set my feet inside of a game studio was more than a decade ago, but it started with an S not M, and I still have contacts in the industry.
        shmerl 9y ago
        > Only FOSS devs see it as time consuming and taxing You don't need to see it, it's a simple fact. Engines like Unreal, Cry/Lumberyard, Unity and etc. aren't FOSS. Plus they are commercial products. Ask their developers if current balkanized mess helps them delivering features for game developers faster. The answer is no, it takes them much longer. So please stop claiming that it's not a problem. It only shows that you aren't sincere.

And developers love rewriting their graphical backends for every target platform, its the best!

by zanny 9y ago

And developers love rewriting their graphical backends for every target platform, its the best!

In reality, for most developers, it is a non-issue to bringup a new graphics API backend. See, for example, Arseny Kapoulkine's experience porting to Metal: http://zeuxcg.org/2016/12/01/metal-retrospective http://zeuxcg.org/2016/12/01/metal-retrospective

ioquatix 9y ago
One example is not most developers. I'm a developer and I get paid to write hardware accelerated renderers and for the past two years I've been recommending Vulkan.. I'm exclusively using Linux these days for software development. Sometimes it's not about what you're targeting for deployment but the capabilities of the development machine. For example, I do like Xcode, but I can't use it for Vulkan development, even if my ultimate platform isn't macOS/Apple. Apple dropped the ball on Vulkan and I do hope they support it eventually.
- pjmlp 9y ago
  Good luck using Vulkan on the PS, XBox or 93% of Android devices out there.
  - ioquatix 9y ago
    We develop server based hardware-accelerated renderers and compositors for web applications, e.g. dynamically generated product images. None of those targets are relevant. Think ImageMagick but done on hardware + 3D geometry in many cases.

pjmlp 9y ago

Yes they do, just indies and FOSS devs on HN don't. The software development culture on the games industry is to make use of the best way to squeeze the graphics performance of a given piece of hardware until the last drop of juice. This is an industry that was born from rewriting their whole games for each type of gaming platform they wanted to sell games to, in Assembly. In many cases using a dumb hexdump editor connected over a serial cable. Having an abstraction layer over all graphics API is a minor inconvenience that can be easily done in one month. Plus it is something that is only written once for a specific engine.

shmerl 9y ago
No, they don't. Because it's not free and wastes their time. You just keep repeating this weird idea, that developers like this balkanized landscape. They don't. No one likes it, except for lock-in freaks who created it to keep cross platform development expensive. > Having an abstraction layer over all graphics API is a minor inconvenience that can be easily done in one month. Quite false. Take a look how long it takes major engines (like Unreal) to implement such abstraction. And how long it takes them to iron out bugs caused by underlying differences. And then try to claim it's a good thing they need to waste all this time. I don't really understand why you personally like this mess.
- pjmlp 9y ago
  Because I have the experience in the games industry that you lack. Apparently from the votes I sometimes get, others also share my life experience.
  - shmerl 9y ago
    If you have experience, you'd know it's time consuming and taxing. You either like this time wasting, or you benefit from this taxation (working for MS?).
    - pjmlp 9y ago
      Only FOSS devs see it as time consuming and taxing, professional game studios see it as an opportunity to explore hardware performance to the last drop. For anyone with experience in graphics programming, the time to triangle is just like doing hello world or playing fizz buzz. The last time I set my feet inside of a game studio was more than a decade ago, but it started with an S not M, and I still have contacts in the industry.
      - shmerl 9y ago
        > Only FOSS devs see it as time consuming and taxing You don't need to see it, it's a simple fact. Engines like Unreal, Cry/Lumberyard, Unity and etc. aren't FOSS. Plus they are commercial products. Ask their developers if current balkanized mess helps them delivering features for game developers faster. The answer is no, it takes them much longer. So please stop claiming that it's not a problem. It only shows that you aren't sincere.