OpenGL's Successor... The Vulkan API - has anyone checked this out yet?

So I stumbled upon this interesting info through the OpenGL wiki

So apparently it’s supposed to replace OpenGL, but is supposed to resemble AMD’s Mantle…??? I’m not sure what the Mantle Code looks like, but I would hope that it’s similar to what we OpenGL programmers already know…

I’m curious if JME has any plans to implement this?

I also assume it might have to do with LWJGL and if they implement this?

It will probably be a few years before it’s stabilized, but it might come out with a bang…

Is this supposed to replace OpenGL for good? I hope they don’t mess it up… >(

Well in short as far as I see it:

Vulcan has a great design, and jme would benefit from this
Early drivers will most likely suck, so lets just wait a little more till it stabilizes.
Never implement a 1.0 API, just compare opengl 1.0 and 1.4 for example, it is usually better to wait a bit here, as else you have to support all kind of old crap forever. cough Remove OpenGL 1 in jME 3.1? Noooooo! - #25 by prog cough we should have never added fixed pipeline support in the 3.x

GLSL is promised to be compatible for the new language as a first supported intermidiate language.
It needs to be determined what else must be changed for vulcan support,
best case → only an additional rendere is necessray (unlikely)
expected case → some modifications to the core are required, to allow it to support vulcan properly

Especially given mantles fast rise and fast dissaperance lets just wait out while the new next gen api is sorted out.

Yes, it is a replacement for OpenGL, AMD has contributed to the spec and Mantle is somewhat of an influence.
It is not like OpenGL - it is lower level, hence requires more work to make even a “hello triangle”. I think it would be pointless to look at implementing Vulkan support in any OSS game engine until it has been released and have good driver support. In other words, don’t worry about it for a couple of years :smile:

And it wouldn’t surprise me if OpenGL drivers will exist to translate from the higher level OpenGL to the lower level Vulkan on the fly, given that shaders are supposed to be compatible.

Empire, thanks!

Yeah it sounds like it’s trying to make things better overall.

Yeah, 1.0 always usually has issues, I think it’s good to wait as well. It will probably look good for something like JME3.2 or JME4, whatever the next Version is…

yeah that thread is LOL… Not too sure what the fixed pipeline is, I could go Google if you don’t want to explain about that :stuck_out_tongue: .

It seems GLSL is important, so that’s good it’s coming along, hopefully isn’t that hard to work with.

I heard about Mantle when it was first coming out, but not much lately LOL…

I guess we will see… Thanks.

yeah, that’s what it looks like. I don’t think it’s cool one company gets to contribute more, so that it runs like it’s on platform… It should be more open and a “new type” of shizzle…

Yeah, it seems to be lower level, so I wonder how it’s going to work for us programmers, who use OpenGL… Will it be like programming in Mantle or CUDA or…???

Yeah, I don’t think we will have to worry about it for a bit, but I’m just curious what people think about it…

Some people complain there is already too many specs… LOL…

if OpenGL gets a revamp, that would be nice, especially for the issue with OpenGL-ES and not being up to GL’s standard with things like “Non-Power-of-2” and such…

yay?:stuck_out_tongue:

Would be nice, but I guess there might be some performance issues with that, compared to direct Vulkan code?

I wonder how the GL community is thinking about this…

If this is supposed to be the “successor” then does that mean 4.5 is the last version?

Hi
If you take a look at the first page of LWJGL website http://www.lwjgl.org/ they announced that the binding for Vulkan will coming soon .

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and a heart for you :slight_smile: . Good call, I didn’t even check LOL…

I also see it says “Objective-C” support…? It seems to be something for Mac OS X…? I thought Obj-C was I-Devices???

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Fixed pipeline is what it sounds like,

lets say a trumpet is a fixed pipeline, it can only do the one thing it is build for in hardware.
a software synthesizer is then shaders and can be reprogrammed to fit your needs.

Opengl 1 was 100% hardware based, nothing reprogrammable. Textured polygons and that was it mostly.

Thanks… That evil OpenGL 1 and it’s evil pre-renderedness… (thinking about 3D stuff on the Snes :P).

Nah opengl 1 is not prerendered, that was a whole oter level of hack:P I mean of course pc :slight_smile:

Opengl 1 is for me:
Unreal (gold)
Quake
Blood Rayne
Half life 1

so pretty far away from being pre rendered.

That’s why I quoted the SNES. I sometimes play with my buddy with emulators, and we look at things like the Legend of Zelda with the pre-rendered stuff hahaha…

WARCRAFT 1? :open_mouth:

Hi

It won’t replace OpenGL. Both OpenGL and Vulkan will coexist, some features will be moved step by step from the latter to the former. Both have different targets, there isn’t only gaming in the world. By the way, JogAmp will support Vulkan, some high level helpers are already going to be adapted to work with these APIs.

I disagree with some comments about OpenGL 1. I refuse encouraging planned obsolescence.

Hmm interesting, thanks. I guess the wiki article needs to be changed from “Vulkan as the successor to OpenGL…”

From your comments about latter and former, I just wanted to make sure you’re saying that Vulkan features will be given to OpenGL, or the opposite?

I know there isn’t only gaming in the world that uses graphics, but I’m curious if this is specific for something else then?

This is unrealted to the use, you can do with vulcan the same you can with opengl basically,
however it has less stuff from back in the fixed pipelin days that makes no sense anymore.

For example opengl have severall types of different data objects (VO DiplayLists ect.), when on current gpus its all just a bytearray. (back then it was hardware units) All of that stuff is removed.

And vulcan is pretty usefull for professional usage, as cad programms often usffer due to the amount of lines they have to draw and the draw call overhead, this will be lower with vulcan as well.

Yeah we know that. I tend to agree on certain things like cars, washing machines and that kind of things.
But for opengl1 it’s just obsolescence. Nothing is planned… and certainly not by us.

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As far as I know, all methods allowing to reduce the driver overhead were planned to be ported from Vulkan (previously called OpenGL Next) to OpenGL, it was the initial plan but it seems that now Vulkan is shown as a successor of OpenGL.

There are different needs in industrial visualization, we need to support various hardware, not just the brand new graphics cards. OpenGL is here for long.

Considering how much is coded already I tend to agree. I started playing with 1.4 one day, and yeah, you can do whatever you want at the best performance level and flexibility. If you are an indie who has ten lives though :wink: Actually, if we’d all be of, say, Adobe size, we’d barely need things like JME and even Java itself. But we’re trying to reduce complexity, right? The price is… well you don’t need to fit into 640k anymore, do you?

I have only one life and my game still “works” correctly by using the fixed pipeline and emulating it where there is no other solution.

I have forgotten one important point. Vulkan can’t replace OpenGL yet as a cross-platform API as Apple doesn’t want to support it (it prefers Metal) and Google blocks OpenCL whereas it is essential to have a complete and consistent alternative to platform dependent APIs like DirectX 12 and Metal (in iOS and in OS X since 10.11).

Ugh Apple… Always causing issues for everyone… and of course they only want their own proprietary shit, because it’s Apple… Cause issues for everyone, and charge them a ton of money… I was at Best Buy on Friday (BF), and saw apple watch wrist bands… These mofos wanted 150$. Yes, One Hundred and Fifty US Dollars… These people serious? The sad thing is PEOPLE WILL BUY IT…

Now Google… wtf no OpenCL support???

Well, it’s always good to have cross-platform tools, which is why OpenGL is so loved. Wasn’t there an issue with OpenGL not working on Apple until like last year? I think the same with Java…

One thing I wanted to ask, which I guess I’ll ask here, is why OpenGL isn’t as popular as DirectX for games (at least on Windows, where most games are created)? It seems a lot of games give choices between DX and OpenGL, but it seems that DirectX is so much more pushed and you hear about it more in the “normal people world” :stuck_out_tongue: where gamers are always talking about it…

Just curious if someone has any comments on DX vs OpenGL, or why DX is preferred?

Maybe this is best for another topic?

Thanks for the help all :slight_smile: