[x3d-public] GPU APIs and X3D

[John Carlson]

I just recently saw that wave-based ray-tracing is now being done.  I had
heard of this in the past—years ago.  It seems like it may be coming to the
market now?

Check out the review of the paper:

https://youtu.be/AjkiBRNVeV8


On Sat, Jul 15, 2023 at 3:53 PM Michalis Kamburelis <
michalis.kambi at gmail.com> wrote:

> We do plan to add Vulkan renderer to Castle Game Engine. Some plans
> and initial insights are on https://castle-engine.io/roadmap#vulkan .
>
> In the meantime, I think OpenGL will remain available for a long time.
> At this point in time, the "OpenGL family" (OpenGL + OpenGLES + WebGL)
> is the only way to really have cross-platform API, the includes all
> desktops (Windows, Linux, macOS, FreeBSD...), mobile (Android, iOS),
> web (WebGL in all browsers) and even console (Nintendo Switch; ANGLE
> allows to use OpenGL on Xbox). So I think there's still plenty of time
> to migrate... but indeed, Khronos explicitly said that after OpenGL
> 4.6, focus is on Vulkan.
>
> Regards,
> Michalis
>
> sob., 15 lip 2023 o 05:35 Andreas Plesch <andreasplesch at gmail.com>
> napisał(a):
> >
> > Although X3D is a high level scene graph, it is influenced by OpenGL
> > and many, perhaps all X3D browsers use OpenGL or the similar WebGL as
> > an API to draw pixels.
> >
> > OpenGL is not updated anymore and other APIs are now dominant: Metal,
> > Vulcan, Direct3D12 and now WebGPU. It is already available in most web
> > browsers as an alternative to WebGL2. WebGPU is cross-platform, close
> > to GPU instructions and can be very performant.
> >
> > Did anybody think about or actually try to use something other than
> > OpenGL for X3D rendering ?
> >
> > It is time to start speculating and mind mapping how one would go
> > about designing a new X3D browser which uses another low-level API.
> > Ideally, X3D is abstract enough that the choice of graphics API does
> > not matter much. But there are certainly many aspects that an
> > implementation has to consider which depend on the low-level API, from
> > the design stage to actual coding.
> >
> > https://webgpufundamentals.org/webgpu/lessons/webgpu-from-webgl.html
> > has a detailed comparison between WebGL and WebGPU.
> >
> > WebGPU is lower level. One example mentioned above is ImageTexture.
> > With WebGL it is possible to just change the source image for the
> > texture, and everything else in the rendering process can stay the
> > same. With WebGPU it is necessary to destroy the old texture, and
> > rebuild a pipeline in case the ImageTexture is changed.
> >
> > A Shape corresponds to a draw call in WebGL. For WebGPU a Shape
> > presumably still could correspond to a draw call but it is also
> > possible to bundle all draw calls for a Scene and submit those in one
> > call. That seems interesting but it is unclear how event flow may
> > affect this option.
> >
> > Any experience with nonGL APIs may be insightful.
> >
> > Andreas
> >
> > --
> > Andreas Plesch
> > Waltham, MA 02453
> >
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