[Fox]

Say Goodbye to OpenGL and Welcome the Next-Gen Vulkan API

A transition will from OpenGL to Vulkan API will take time
Vulkan API is the name of the Next Generation OpenGL initiative and it's the successor of the current OpenGL solution. It's still in the early stages of development, but it's coming.

OpenGL is a rendering API for 2D and 3D graphics and it's been an important Linux component for many years, even if it's a cross-platform API. Some of you might remember that some games on the Windows platform, like Half-Life for example, gave you the option to choose between Direct3D and OpenGL. You probably didn't see any major changes then and there aren't all that many now.

Unfortunately for OpenGL, a lot of money and effort has been poured into Direct3D, but that was understandable. It was needed in one of the most used operating systems on the market. OpenGL didn't have the same fortune, but it never went away. Now, the opposite is happening and it looks like it's making a comeback.

The problem is that OpenGL is old and no matter how versatile it is and no matter how many extensions are released for it, it's no longer suited for the future of the industry. This is why the Khronos Group (consortium of various hardware and software companies) is now announcing Vulkan API, which should be the replacement of the old and trusted OpenGL.
Vulkan API is still in its early stages

Khronos Group is not a shady enterprise, although its name is relatively unknown to the general public. It's a non-profit organization that has members like AMD, Intel, Apple, Qualcomm, Sony, Google, Adobe, Amazon, Pixar, Valve, and pretty much all of the major players, including Microsoft.

"The availability of technical previews for the new Vulkan open standard API has been announced for high-efficiency access to graphics and compute on modern GPUs used in a wide variety of devices. This ground-up design, previously referred to as the Next Generation OpenGL® Initiative, provides applications direct control over GPU acceleration for maximized performance and predictability, and uses Khronos’ new SPIR-V™ specification for shading language flexibility," reads the announcement from Khronos Group.

A preview session named "Vulkan: The Future of High Performance Graphics" will be hosted by Valve at the upcoming GDC conference in San Francisco, so you know that they are very serious with this stuff. In fact, Valve is one of the companies that have the most to gain from the success of Vulkan API, so the entire gaming community will watch this event.

http://news.softpedi...PI-474716.shtml

[DNSKILL5]

I can't wait for all this to unfold

[Inspector Lagomorf]

What the thread title said:

Say Goodbye to OpenGL and Welcome the Next-Gen Vulkan API

What my mind said:

Say Goodbye to Polymer

[Tea Monster]

It's only the future of graphics if everyone agrees to use it.

[Duke of Hazzard]

Regarding Polymer, isn't it funny that we're in a gaming forum and therefore against Nvidia's bribery of devs to make games faster on their hardware, yet we mostly support a source port with a rendering engine that basically tells AMD users to screw themselves?

[Yatta]

 Comrade Major, on 27 March 2015 - 11:16 AM, said:

[/b]

It'll have to be backwards compatible unless they want to break a big number of previous gen games....

[Mblackwell]

It's not backwards compatible. OGL isn't going away.

They're two different APIs.

[Person of Color]

I'm still waiting for Plagman to port Polymer to S3 MeTaL.

Fucking asshole.

[Micky C]

Looks like Polymer will have to be ditched and a new renderer written. Polymore, coming to an internet near you in 2153.

[Lunick]

Why not hand Polymer over to a developer named Peter and call it Polyneux.

[Mark]

Polymer is what it is. I'll continue to use it. Not much choice.

[Mblackwell]

Theoretically you could actually write an OGL compatibility layer using Vulkan, but why would you when drivers will still support GL directly? Additionally work is still being done on AZDO for GL.

Anyway, watch some of the presentations on Vulkan. It's pretty interesting/exciting if you're the kind of person that likes to geek out on graphics APIs. It even (potentially, since I've only seen one game demo and one tech demo) turns Intel iGPUs into something not to scoff at.

[supergoofy]

Let's all move to Glide API

I think that OpenGL and DirectX will stay the main 2D/3D API, at least for the next 2-3 years.

Note: Glide had potential, but it wasn't open. It was developed for and targeted only Voodoo cards.