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I'd heard about this, which I think added to my confusion. My general impression is that Vulkan, Metal, and WebGPU are all separate attempts at modernizing grap
by danielvaughn 3y ago
I'd heard about this, which I think added to my confusion. My general impression is that Vulkan, Metal, and WebGPU are all separate attempts at modernizing graphics, so they're all kind of related in some sense but they're also distinct and incompatible with each other. So graphics in general are moving away from the legacy OpenGL model (good), but it's also fragmenting (bad). Fair take or no?
- dist-epoch 3y agoYour average graphics developer is not supposed to use Vulkan/Metal/Direct3D directly, but through an engine. So in a way it doesn't really matter what these low level APIs are like.
- TheRoque 3y agoWebGPU is different because it's an abstraction of Vulkan, Metal or DX. Yes, the fragmenting is bad and annoying, WebGPU is the only graphics API that Apple agreed on and that would be truly natively cross-platform, but it's still new, lacking some features, and evolving.
- troupo 3y ago> WebGPU is the only graphics API that Apple agreed on It's was an API they and Firefox presented as a proposal for new graphics API. And it was Google who agreed to follow suit (they had their own proposal)
- qiine 3y agoThe moving away part is taking decade of slow and confusing but still huge progress indeed. And as other have stated the absolutely CRUCIAL question in picking your API, is going to be : what do you want to do ?
- flohofwoe 3y agoVulkan, D3D12 and Metal all map to similar GPU hardware, so the basic concepts are also similar. They mostly differ in details like 'programmer ergonomics', design philosophy, and of course platform-availability. WebGPU is basically the cross section of those three native APIs.
- hajile 3y agoIsn't WebGPU far closer to Metal than to Vulkan or D3D12?