4 ms·

Arm should rather invest some effort in providing documentation on programming their GPUs instead of comics...

mouse_ 4y ago
ARM is a CPU architecture; honestly it should have nothing to do with GPUs. In practice, GPUs on ARM have served as hardware DRM. Want to update your cool Linux SBC? Haha, better hope the OEM wants to also, otherwise you're screwed. Want to develop a custom OS for your smartphone? Haha, "NO"!
- einpoklum 4y ago
  ARM is a company, not an architecture. They offer processor core designs in several architectures of theirs. Here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ARM_processors https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ARM_processors is a list of their CPUs, and CPUs based on their work. They also offer GPUs, e.g. the Mali line, see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mali_(processor) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mali_(processor)
- gsliepen 4y ago
  While the situation is definitely undesirable, it's not Arm's fault that it is hard to update your SBC. Arm doesn't make the single board computers (SBCs), they just license processor designs to system-on-chip (SoC) vendors, and then other vendors build SBCs around the SoCs. You buy something from the SBC vendor, and they should ultimately provide you with support, but most of them just don't care. Ideally Arm would have created fully open source drivers, but they might have reasons not to, like having to protect their intellectual property (IP), or perhaps even IP they licensed from third parties that is included in their own products. Also, if no customer of Arm (and remember, you are not a customer of Arm, SoC vendors are) asks for an open source driver, they might not want to spend the effort making one. Arm is certainly not alone in this, it's the same for virtually all other mobile GPU vendor, and also NVIDIA doesn't provide open source drivers. Note that Arm does make updates to their closed-source user-space driver available (see https://developer.arm.com/downloads/-/mali-drivers/user-space https://developer.arm.com/downloads/-/mali-drivers/user-spac..., it also depends on a kernel driver but that one is open source) for some SBCs, however with SoCs, the problem is that there is a tight integration between components, and the GPU itself for example might depend on clock and voltage regulators added by the SoC vendor that the GPU has no control over, so only the SoC vendor can provide the software/patches necessary to make everything work together. Ideally the SoC vendor provides regular updates, which the SBC vendor passes on to you, but they often don't. Luckily, the open source community is working towards upstreaming all the various bits that the proprietary vendors neglect to, and there is the open-source Panfrost driver which is working for a wide range of Mali GPUs already. So some boards, for example the ASUS TinkerBoard, now fully work with upgradable, upstream kernels.
TazeTSchnitzel 4y ago
The comics are part of their developer outreach effort.
- justinjlynn 4y ago
  I've always thought that "developer outreach" was an interesting way to spell "the sales department making engineers create marketing material to order in order to target their customer's engineering departments' engineers".
  - OJFord 4y ago
    IME (which is limited but includes (in the past) Arm fwiw) developer relations/outreach/application engineering is done by people with an engineering background primarily, not a marketing one. I've considered such job listings myself, they always seem to be looking for experience with the tools rather than experience selling.
    - justinjlynn 4y ago
      Well, yes, of course the job of developer outreach is performed by engineers, but under the aegis of marketing - which was the point of my statement above, unless I miscommunicated.
      - OJFord 4y ago
        Ah ok, I misunderstood your comment then.
- flykespice 4y ago
  Do they think developers are kids? If you want to reach developers, offer high detailed documentation that covers all the aspects of the GPU workings
  - skeaker 4y ago
    Something simpler like this casts a much wider net in terms of who it can attract, and I recall another similar technical manga like this one going viral, so this was probably made to try and recapture that success.
gsliepen 4y ago
What makes you think they don't? A quick search will reveal things like: https://developer.arm.com/documentation/101897/0301 https://developer.arm.com/documentation/101897/0301

ARM is a CPU architecture; honestly it should have nothing to do with GPUs. In practice, GPUs on ARM have served as hardware DRM. Want to update your cool Linux SBC? Haha, better hope the OEM wants to also, otherwise you're screwed. Want to develop a custom OS for your smartphone? Haha, "NO"!

einpoklum 4y ago
ARM is a company, not an architecture. They offer processor core designs in several architectures of theirs. Here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ARM_processors https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ARM_processors is a list of their CPUs, and CPUs based on their work. They also offer GPUs, e.g. the Mali line, see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mali_(processor) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mali_(processor)
gsliepen 4y ago
While the situation is definitely undesirable, it's not Arm's fault that it is hard to update your SBC. Arm doesn't make the single board computers (SBCs), they just license processor designs to system-on-chip (SoC) vendors, and then other vendors build SBCs around the SoCs. You buy something from the SBC vendor, and they should ultimately provide you with support, but most of them just don't care. Ideally Arm would have created fully open source drivers, but they might have reasons not to, like having to protect their intellectual property (IP), or perhaps even IP they licensed from third parties that is included in their own products. Also, if no customer of Arm (and remember, you are not a customer of Arm, SoC vendors are) asks for an open source driver, they might not want to spend the effort making one. Arm is certainly not alone in this, it's the same for virtually all other mobile GPU vendor, and also NVIDIA doesn't provide open source drivers. Note that Arm does make updates to their closed-source user-space driver available (see https://developer.arm.com/downloads/-/mali-drivers/user-space https://developer.arm.com/downloads/-/mali-drivers/user-spac..., it also depends on a kernel driver but that one is open source) for some SBCs, however with SoCs, the problem is that there is a tight integration between components, and the GPU itself for example might depend on clock and voltage regulators added by the SoC vendor that the GPU has no control over, so only the SoC vendor can provide the software/patches necessary to make everything work together. Ideally the SoC vendor provides regular updates, which the SBC vendor passes on to you, but they often don't. Luckily, the open source community is working towards upstreaming all the various bits that the proprietary vendors neglect to, and there is the open-source Panfrost driver which is working for a wide range of Mali GPUs already. So some boards, for example the ASUS TinkerBoard, now fully work with upgradable, upstream kernels.

TazeTSchnitzel 4y ago

The comics are part of their developer outreach effort.

justinjlynn 4y ago
I've always thought that "developer outreach" was an interesting way to spell "the sales department making engineers create marketing material to order in order to target their customer's engineering departments' engineers".
- OJFord 4y ago
  IME (which is limited but includes (in the past) Arm fwiw) developer relations/outreach/application engineering is done by people with an engineering background primarily, not a marketing one. I've considered such job listings myself, they always seem to be looking for experience with the tools rather than experience selling.
  - justinjlynn 4y ago
    Well, yes, of course the job of developer outreach is performed by engineers, but under the aegis of marketing - which was the point of my statement above, unless I miscommunicated.
    - OJFord 4y ago
      Ah ok, I misunderstood your comment then.
flykespice 4y ago
Do they think developers are kids? If you want to reach developers, offer high detailed documentation that covers all the aspects of the GPU workings
- skeaker 4y ago
  Something simpler like this casts a much wider net in terms of who it can attract, and I recall another similar technical manga like this one going viral, so this was probably made to try and recapture that success.

gsliepen 4y ago

What makes you think they don't? A quick search will reveal things like: https://developer.arm.com/documentation/101897/0301 https://developer.arm.com/documentation/101897/0301