13 ms·

The Supercomputer In Your Pocket: Metal and Swift

98 points by astigsen 11y ago

_random_ 11y ago
Please add Metal & Swift to the title: mentioning these proprietary closed-source technologies might change peoples' expectation.
- oldmanjay 11y ago
  Do we really need trigger warnings for proprietary software? HN has never been a dogmatic bastion of free software.
  - duaneb 11y ago
    It's not very relevant to smartphones as a whole, it's just Apple's take on it.
  - zxcvcxz 11y ago
    !UNPOPULAR OPINION TIME! I was triggered. I do my best to stay away from Apple altogether. I believe in a world where companies are shamed into oblivion for not allowing their software to run across all platforms. Apple doesn't work for the people, they work for the shareholders. Since I don't own any shares I'm dirt under their feet. A lot of people on HN like to talk about power and privilege but when it comes to companies like Apple they make any excuse for their blatant platform discrimination.
    - seivan 11y ago
      You're triggered by software while female Kurdish civilians spontaneously turned into soldiers face an enemy that rapes captured females. Please for the love of God, go back to tumblr.
      - zxcvcxz 11y ago
        Wow that was way out of left field. Am I not allowed to not like Apple because there’s a war in the middle east? Maybe you're the one who needs to go back to tumblr and stop trying to push your political agenda on everyone you come into contact with. From your comment history you seem to find any excuse you can to butt in with some lame comment about the middle east. I guess this is just an attempt to control the narrative and push your political agenda. If anyone disagrees you paint them as some kind of supporter of rape. This is something I expect from tumblr.
    - sp332 11y ago
      You had PTSD flashbacks from reading an article about Apple? http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trauma_trigger http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trauma_trigger
      - zxcvcxz 11y ago
        Hey am I not allowed to be a bit sarcastic? So many tumblrinas use that word they've killed it's meaning. Don't blame me, blame social justice warriors.
        sp332 11y ago
        Poe's Law - I couldn't tell you were being sarcastic.
        cpach 11y ago
        Please don’t use terms like SJW here. I can’t see how it’s relevant or adds anything to the discussion.
sp332 11y ago
Oh, it has a transcript! With code samples! I don't even know what Realm does but I like them already.
- joeblau 11y ago
  They make a database alternative to CoreData/SQLite.
- morqon 11y ago
  And subtitles! All talks should be done like this.
jph 11y ago
Metal is Apple’s iOS framework for GPU programming. The slides are about GPU programming using Metal, Swift, and some Objective-C for features such as shaders.
santaclaus 11y ago
How far back in time does one need to go for a state of the art iPhone to rank on the TOP500 LINPACK benchmark?
- sp332 11y ago
  1994, just the third year the Top500 list existed. http://www.top500.org/statistics/perfdevel/ http://www.top500.org/statistics/perfdevel/ According to http://www.cnet.com/products/apple-iphone-6-plus/2/ http://www.cnet.com/products/apple-iphone-6-plus/2/ the iPhone 6 gets 1.3 gigaflops. Edit: Ah, I thought it looked low! That number is just for the iPhone CPU. I can't find an official number for the GPU but one Linpack run got 1,023 Gflops. That means it would rank in 2004.
  - bitL 11y ago
    That is true for CPU, how about GPU? Tegra K1 is >1Tflop which would be the total computing power available in 1994.
    - deleted 11y ago
      [deleted]
    - dm2 11y ago
      And the latest Tegra X1 is twice as powerful as the K1, which was already an amazing chip. The even more amazing part is the energy usage of these new mobile chips.
    - euphoria 11y ago
      Titan Z can do 8 teraflops. From the Top500 List - June 2001, the #1 system at Lawrence Livermore could do R(max) 7 teraflops and R(peak) 12 teraflops. I now see that I missed the gist of this, which was about mobile performance. The Tegra X1 can do a teraflop, which would put it at #2 on the Top500 List - June 1998.
    - jra101 11y ago
      Tegra K1 is 365 GFLOPs @ 950 MHz. Tegra X1 is > 1 TFLOP @ ~1GHz. http://www.anandtech.com/show/9289/the-nvidia-shield-android-tv-review/2 http://www.anandtech.com/show/9289/the-nvidia-shield-android...
Osmium 11y ago
This is really inspiring stuff. Highly recommend the author's blog[1] (sadly on blogspot) and GitHub page[2] too. His last section on 'advanced particle systems' might be able to be sped up considerably by using an appropriate neighbour list algorithm (e.g. parallel Verlet) which would scale as O(N) instead of O(N^2). I'm working on something similar myself at the moment, though with far fewer particles, but it really is inspiring to see it work with so many on a mobile device. Can't wait for WWDC to see if there are any updates to Metal (and SceneKit for that matter). [1] http://flexmonkey.blogspot.co.uk http://flexmonkey.blogspot.co.uk [2] https://github.com/FlexMonkey https://github.com/FlexMonkey
- justinhj 11y ago
  Why sadly?
  - Osmium 11y ago
    Blogspot has a a really weird layout. It's very buggy for me in Safari, and makes browsing old posts really difficult. It also seems to take a while for content to even appear on the screen.
- morqon 11y ago
  I think he is talking on a similar topic at AltConf, Tuesday 9th: http://altconf.com/schedule/ http://altconf.com/schedule/
melling 11y ago
Simon's blog has lots of interesting Metal posts. I've got them catalogued here: http://www.h4labs.com/dev/ios/swift.html?q=flexmonkey&age=10000 http://www.h4labs.com/dev/ios/swift.html?q=flexmonkey&age=10...
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
sirsuki 11y ago
Wait if the iPhone is so "amazing" why is the best games for it angry birds?! Where is my World of Warcraft damn it!
- awakeasleep 11y ago
  Angry birds does a better job of satisfying humanity's desire for a game than world of warcraft.
- jawngee 11y ago
  You should try Vainglory.
hyperpallium 11y ago
Is the shader code available anywhere? If every particle affects every other, wouldn't 2 million particles require 2,000,000^2 calculations per frame? 30*4 trillion interactions per sec seems a lot... or is there an efficient trick to it (in the shader)?

98 points by astigsen 11y ago

Please add Metal & Swift to the title: mentioning these proprietary closed-source technologies might change peoples' expectation.

oldmanjay 11y ago
Do we really need trigger warnings for proprietary software? HN has never been a dogmatic bastion of free software.
- duaneb 11y ago
  It's not very relevant to smartphones as a whole, it's just Apple's take on it.
- zxcvcxz 11y ago
  !UNPOPULAR OPINION TIME! I was triggered. I do my best to stay away from Apple altogether. I believe in a world where companies are shamed into oblivion for not allowing their software to run across all platforms. Apple doesn't work for the people, they work for the shareholders. Since I don't own any shares I'm dirt under their feet. A lot of people on HN like to talk about power and privilege but when it comes to companies like Apple they make any excuse for their blatant platform discrimination.
  - seivan 11y ago
    You're triggered by software while female Kurdish civilians spontaneously turned into soldiers face an enemy that rapes captured females. Please for the love of God, go back to tumblr.
    - zxcvcxz 11y ago
      Wow that was way out of left field. Am I not allowed to not like Apple because there’s a war in the middle east? Maybe you're the one who needs to go back to tumblr and stop trying to push your political agenda on everyone you come into contact with. From your comment history you seem to find any excuse you can to butt in with some lame comment about the middle east. I guess this is just an attempt to control the narrative and push your political agenda. If anyone disagrees you paint them as some kind of supporter of rape. This is something I expect from tumblr.
  - sp332 11y ago
    You had PTSD flashbacks from reading an article about Apple? http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trauma_trigger http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trauma_trigger
    - zxcvcxz 11y ago
      Hey am I not allowed to be a bit sarcastic? So many tumblrinas use that word they've killed it's meaning. Don't blame me, blame social justice warriors.
      - sp332 11y ago
        Poe's Law - I couldn't tell you were being sarcastic.
      - cpach 11y ago
        Please don’t use terms like SJW here. I can’t see how it’s relevant or adds anything to the discussion.

sp332 11y ago

Oh, it has a transcript! With code samples! I don't even know what Realm does but I like them already.

joeblau 11y ago
They make a database alternative to CoreData/SQLite.
morqon 11y ago
And subtitles! All talks should be done like this.

jph 11y ago

Metal is Apple’s iOS framework for GPU programming. The slides are about GPU programming using Metal, Swift, and some Objective-C for features such as shaders.

santaclaus 11y ago

How far back in time does one need to go for a state of the art iPhone to rank on the TOP500 LINPACK benchmark?

sp332 11y ago
1994, just the third year the Top500 list existed. http://www.top500.org/statistics/perfdevel/ http://www.top500.org/statistics/perfdevel/ According to http://www.cnet.com/products/apple-iphone-6-plus/2/ http://www.cnet.com/products/apple-iphone-6-plus/2/ the iPhone 6 gets 1.3 gigaflops. Edit: Ah, I thought it looked low! That number is just for the iPhone CPU. I can't find an official number for the GPU but one Linpack run got 1,023 Gflops. That means it would rank in 2004.
- bitL 11y ago
  That is true for CPU, how about GPU? Tegra K1 is >1Tflop which would be the total computing power available in 1994.
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
  - dm2 11y ago
    And the latest Tegra X1 is twice as powerful as the K1, which was already an amazing chip. The even more amazing part is the energy usage of these new mobile chips.
  - euphoria 11y ago
    Titan Z can do 8 teraflops. From the Top500 List - June 2001, the #1 system at Lawrence Livermore could do R(max) 7 teraflops and R(peak) 12 teraflops. I now see that I missed the gist of this, which was about mobile performance. The Tegra X1 can do a teraflop, which would put it at #2 on the Top500 List - June 1998.
  - jra101 11y ago
    Tegra K1 is 365 GFLOPs @ 950 MHz. Tegra X1 is > 1 TFLOP @ ~1GHz. http://www.anandtech.com/show/9289/the-nvidia-shield-android-tv-review/2 http://www.anandtech.com/show/9289/the-nvidia-shield-android...

Osmium 11y ago

This is really inspiring stuff. Highly recommend the author's blog[1] (sadly on blogspot) and GitHub page[2] too. His last section on 'advanced particle systems' might be able to be sped up considerably by using an appropriate neighbour list algorithm (e.g. parallel Verlet) which would scale as O(N) instead of O(N^2). I'm working on something similar myself at the moment, though with far fewer particles, but it really is inspiring to see it work with so many on a mobile device. Can't wait for WWDC to see if there are any updates to Metal (and SceneKit for that matter). [1] http://flexmonkey.blogspot.co.uk http://flexmonkey.blogspot.co.uk [2] https://github.com/FlexMonkey https://github.com/FlexMonkey

justinhj 11y ago
Why sadly?
- Osmium 11y ago
  Blogspot has a a really weird layout. It's very buggy for me in Safari, and makes browsing old posts really difficult. It also seems to take a while for content to even appear on the screen.
morqon 11y ago
I think he is talking on a similar topic at AltConf, Tuesday 9th: http://altconf.com/schedule/ http://altconf.com/schedule/

melling 11y ago

Simon's blog has lots of interesting Metal posts. I've got them catalogued here: http://www.h4labs.com/dev/ios/swift.html?q=flexmonkey&age=10000 http://www.h4labs.com/dev/ios/swift.html?q=flexmonkey&age=10...

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

sirsuki 11y ago

Wait if the iPhone is so "amazing" why is the best games for it angry birds?! Where is my World of Warcraft damn it!

awakeasleep 11y ago
Angry birds does a better job of satisfying humanity's desire for a game than world of warcraft.
jawngee 11y ago
You should try Vainglory.

hyperpallium 11y ago

Is the shader code available anywhere? If every particle affects every other, wouldn't 2 million particles require 2,000,000^2 calculations per frame? 30*4 trillion interactions per sec seems a lot... or is there an efficient trick to it (in the shader)?