Advanced Micro Devices Corporation

Ati Technologies Ulc

Brian K Bennett

Guennadi Riguer

Michael Mantor

Christopher Jude Brennan

David Ronald Oldcorn

Matthäus G Chajdas

Robert W Martin

Qun Lin

Rex Eldon Mccrary

Amit Ben-Moshe

Systems, apparatuses, and methods for implementing a hierarchical scheduling in fixed-function graphics pipeline are disclosed. In various implementations, a processor includes a pipeline comprising a plurality of fixed-function units and a scheduler. The scheduler is configured to schedule a first operation for execution by one or more fixed-function units of the pipeline by scheduling the first operation with a first unit of the pipeline, responsive to a first mode of operation and schedule a second operation for execution by a selected fixed-function unit of the pipeline by scheduling the second operation directly to the selected fixed-function unit, independent of a sequential arrangement of the one or more fixed-function units in the pipeline, responsive to a second mode of operation.

System and method for scheduling operations in a graphics pipeline

Methods are provided for creating objects in a way that permits an API client to explicitly participate in memory management for an object created using the API. Methods for managing data object memory include requesting memory requirements for an object using an API and expressly allocating a memory location for the object based on the memory requirements. Methods are also provided for cloning objects such that a state of the object remains unchanged from the original object to the cloned object or can be explicitly specified.

Memory management in graphics and compute application programming interfaces

Systems, apparatuses, and methods for implementing graphics pipeline optimizations are disclosed. A user interface (UI) is generated to allow a user to analyze shaders and determine resource utilization on any of multiple different target graphic devices. The UI allows the user to manipulate the state associated with the target graphics device for a given graphics pipeline. After being edited by the user, the state of the graphics pipeline is converted into a textual representation and input into a meta-app. The meta-app creates an application programming interface (API) construct from the shader source code and textual representation of the state which is compiled by a driver component into machine-level instructions. Also, resource usage statistics are generated for a simulated run of the graphics pipeline on the target graphics device. Then, the machine-level instructions and resource usage statistics are displayed in the UI for the user to analyze.

Graphics pipeline optimizations

Shader resources may be specified for input to a shader using a hierarchical data structure which may be referred to as a descriptor set. The descriptor set may be bound to a bind point of the shader and may contain slots with pointers to memory containing shader resources. The shader may reference a particular slot of the descriptor set using an offset, and may change shader resources by referencing a different slot of the descriptor set or by binding or rebinding a new descriptor set. A graphics pipeline may be specified by creating a pipeline object which specifies a shader and a rendering context object, and linking the pipeline object. Part or all of the pipeline may be validated, cross-validated, or optimized during linking.

Shader pipelines and hierarchical shader resources

Growing community of inventors

Northborough, MA, United States of America

Brian K Bennett