RADV: A Community Open-Source Effort To Get Vulkan Working On Radeon

[phoronix]

Phoronix: RADV: A Community Open-Source Effort To Get Vulkan Working On Radeon

While AMD has said they will open-source their Vulkan driver currently part of AMDGPU-PRO, months later they have yet to do so nor has there been any communication when that open-sourcing might happen. In the mean time, David Airlie at Red Hat has begun work on "RADV", an unofficial Radeon Vulkan driver...

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=RADV-Radeon-Vulkan-Driver

[schmidtbag]

I don't get it - why? In what situation is it necessary or required for radeon users to have open-source access to Vulkan, now? Remember to consider currently available applications that will also take advantage of it, and that AMD may at some point open source their current driver. This seems like a wasted effort.

The only situation where I see this as being particularly useful is if someone is using a PCIe GPU on ARM. To make things more confusing, GCN 1.0 and 1.1 GPUs are the ones that need this attention most, and they're currently not a focus for this.

[SaucyJack]

Wtf? AMD said multiple times (or maybe it was just bridgman) that they would open source it after about a year.

[airlied]

I don't get it - why? In what situation is it necessary or required for radeon users to have open-source access to Vulkan, now? Remember to consider currently available applications that will also take advantage of it, and that AMD may at some point open source their current driver. This seems like a wasted effort.

The only situation where I see this as being particularly useful is if someone is using a PCIe GPU on ARM. To make things more confusing, GCN 1.0 and 1.1 GPUs are the ones that need this attention most, and they're currently not a focus for this.

Does it need a reason? why did Linus start Linux, surely not because of the users or available applications. I had an itch, I had some time to scratch it in, who knows where it'll lead, either AMD will or will not open source their stuff, but I don't want to pend the future on promises. The only open source code is code that is open sourced, promises aren't code.

Dave.

[kmare]

Huge thanks airlied ! your work is certainly much appreciated!

[dungeon]

Yeah, go and write your own driver... if someone is capable why not

[zxy_thf]

Does it need a reason? why did Linus start Linux, surely not because of the users or available applications. I had an itch, I had some time to scratch it in, who knows where it'll lead, either AMD will or will not open source their stuff, but I don't want to pend the future on promises. The only open source code is code that is open sourced, promises aren't code.

Dave.

I can't agree more. I don't remember how many times I saw NVIDIA told us they were planning to "open" something.

[haagch]

At the current rate I wouldn't be surprised if Southern Islands gets Vulkan support first through this.

Also mailing list link: https://lists.freedesktop.org/archiv...ly/123861.html

[stqn]

I hadn’t realised that the FOSS AMD driver for the RX 480 didn’t have Vulkan support. That should help with choosing my next GPU…

[schmidtbag]

I hadn’t realised that the FOSS AMD driver for the RX 480 didn’t have Vulkan support. That should help with choosing my next GPU…

Meaning what? If you go for nvidia, you're not getting FOSS Vulkan support at all, if ever. If you go for Intel, to my knowledge, only Broadwell supports it.

Does it need a reason? why did Linus start Linux, surely not because of the users or available applications. I had an itch, I had some time to scratch it in, who knows where it'll lead, either AMD will or will not open source their stuff, but I don't want to pend the future on promises. The only open source code is code that is open sourced, promises aren't code.

But here's what I don't get - why not nouveau? They need all the help they can get. Instead, you're focusing on giving Vulkan support to GPUs that already have it. Meanwhile, there are other AMD GPUs that are not getting enough Vulkan support (such as Hawaii) and you chose not to support those yet. The priorities just don't make sense to me. I don't mind that you're supporting AMD for Vulkan drivers, but why not support the ones that need it most? When you bring a 3 children to an ice cream parlor, why would you buy only one kid 3 desserts, who already had one before arriving?

I appreciate your efforts, I just implore you reconsider which chips you support first. We need people like you to help out with Vulkan.