4 ms·

WebGPU Shading Language

4 points by throwaway34241 7y ago

throwaway34241 7y ago
Some context: browser vendors are working on a successor to WebGL, and there's been a debate over what shading language to use. A text based language would be easier for beginners (since they wouldn't need to install a separate shader compiler) and would avoid sites that need dynamic shaders having to download and run a shader compiler in the browser. Using SPIR-V bytecode would benefit from a large amount of work put into an existing standard and an open source compiler ecosystem that many companies are already using. It looks like a decision has been made to accept a text based language, but one that is defined based on SPIR-V semantics and is easily convertible back and forth from SPIR-V. This seems like a great trade off since if it works out it should have the main advantages of both approaches.
- ArtWomb 7y ago
  Thanks for posting ;) Just curious if anyone has actually gotten the WebGPU bits to run? Getting a device context, executing commands. Currently on CrOS. Able to install vulkan, rust-wasm, and wgpu. But then I just get initialization errors. WebGL 2.0 Compute works when enabled in Chrome 79. My interest is in creating web gpu grids for scientific computing
datahipster 7y ago
Kudos to Google for moving this along! A few weeks, the HN community picked up [0, 1] on a presentation [2] about the Tint shading language, a WebGPU shading language prototype. It's great to see them formalize their prototype into a draft spec. Thank you to those who are working hard on bringing WebGPU to the masses! [0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22316777 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22316777 [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22351285 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22351285 [2]: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1qHhFq0GJtY_59rNjpiHU--JW4bW4Ji3zWei-gM6cabs/edit https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1qHhFq0GJtY_59rNjpiHU...

4 ms·

WebGPU Shading Language

4 points by throwaway34241 7y ago

throwaway34241 7y ago
Some context: browser vendors are working on a successor to WebGL, and there's been a debate over what shading language to use. A text based language would be easier for beginners (since they wouldn't need to install a separate shader compiler) and would avoid sites that need dynamic shaders having to download and run a shader compiler in the browser. Using SPIR-V bytecode would benefit from a large amount of work put into an existing standard and an open source compiler ecosystem that many companies are already using. It looks like a decision has been made to accept a text based language, but one that is defined based on SPIR-V semantics and is easily convertible back and forth from SPIR-V. This seems like a great trade off since if it works out it should have the main advantages of both approaches.
- ArtWomb 7y ago
  Thanks for posting ;) Just curious if anyone has actually gotten the WebGPU bits to run? Getting a device context, executing commands. Currently on CrOS. Able to install vulkan, rust-wasm, and wgpu. But then I just get initialization errors. WebGL 2.0 Compute works when enabled in Chrome 79. My interest is in creating web gpu grids for scientific computing
datahipster 7y ago
Kudos to Google for moving this along! A few weeks, the HN community picked up [0, 1] on a presentation [2] about the Tint shading language, a WebGPU shading language prototype. It's great to see them formalize their prototype into a draft spec. Thank you to those who are working hard on bringing WebGPU to the masses! [0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22316777 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22316777 [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22351285 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22351285 [2]: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1qHhFq0GJtY_59rNjpiHU--JW4bW4Ji3zWei-gM6cabs/edit https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1qHhFq0GJtY_59rNjpiHU...