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If you don't think the GPU drivers are complex, then look at the perf difference between nouveau and the nvidia proprietary driver. Those guys are also working
by StillBored 7y ago
If you don't think the GPU drivers are complex, then look at the perf difference between nouveau and the nvidia proprietary driver. Those guys are also working on the bleeding edge of optimization. Sure you could write a working driver in short order, but its not going to perform the same.
- tsimionescu 7y agoI'm not saying that they are not complex, that's why I chose them. But you have the source code for them, you don't have to write them from scratch. Some of the optimization techniques, even if not documented, can probably be studied from the change history. Of course, it will take a few years to grow new experts without knowledge passing from the old ones, but by and large the logic is there in the code. From what I understand, the same can't be said of real microprocessor design - the complexities of aligning logical requirements with EE complexities, analog responses, and manufacturing process limitations are not at all captured in the 'code', not at the same level. We can hope that they are documented, at least to some extent, but we all know the general priority of internal documentation against other concerns, and the difficulty of documenting design processes.