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<HTML>
<TITLE>Shading Language Support</TITLE>
<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="mesa.css"></head>
<BODY>
<H1>Shading Language Support</H1>
<p>
This page describes the features and status of Mesa's support for the
<a href="http://opengl.org/documentation/glsl/" target="_parent">
OpenGL Shading Language</a>.
</p>
<p>
Last updated on 17 Feb 2007.
</p>
<p>
Contents
</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="#unsup">Unsupported Features</a>
<li><a href="#impl">Implementation Notes</a>
<li><a href="#hints">Programming Hints</a>
<li><a href="#standalone">Stand-alone Compiler</a>
</ul>
<a name="unsup">
<h2>Unsupported Features</h2>
<p>
The following features of the shading language are not yet supported
in Mesa:
</p>
<ul>
<li>Dereferencing arrays with non-constant indexes
<li>User-defined structs
<li>Linking of multiple shaders is not supported
<li>Integer operations are not fully implemented (most are implemented
as floating point).
</ul>
<p>
All other major features of the shading language should function.
</p>
<a name="impl">
<h2>Implementation Notes</h2>
<ul>
<li>Shading language programs are compiled into low-level programs
very similar to those of GL_ARB_vertex/fragment_program.
<li>All vector types (vec2, vec3, vec4, bvec2, etc) currently occupy full
float[4] registers.
<li>Float constants and variables are packed so that up to four floats
can occupy one program parameter/register.
<li>All function calls are inlined.
<li>Shaders which use too many registers will not compile.
<li>The quality of generated code is pretty good, register usage is fair.
<li>Shader error detection and reporting of errors (InfoLog) is not
very good yet.
<li>There are massive memory leaks in the compiler.
</ul>
<p>
These issues will be addressed/resolved in the future.
</p>
<a name="hints">
<h2>Programming Hints</h2>
<ul>
<li>Declare <em>in</em> function parameters as <em>const</em> whenever possible.
This improves the efficiency of function inlining.
</li>
<br>
<li>To reduce register usage, declare variables within smaller scopes.
For example, the following code:
<pre>
void main()
{
vec4 a1, a2, b1, b2;
gl_Position = expression using a1, a2.
gl_Color = expression using b1, b2;
}
</pre>
Can be rewritten as follows to use half as many registers:
<pre>
void main()
{
{
vec4 a1, a2;
gl_Position = expression using a1, a2.
}
{
vec4 b1, b2;
gl_Color = expression using b1, b2;
}
}
</pre>
Alternately, rather than using several float variables, use
a vec4 instead. Use swizzling and writemasks to access the
components of the vec4 as floats.
</li>
<br>
<li>Use the built-in library functions whenever possible.
For example, instead of writing this:
<pre>
float x = 1.0 / sqrt(y);
</pre>
Write this:
<pre>
float x = inversesqrt(y);
</pre>
</ul>
<a name="standalone">
<h2>Stand-alone Compiler</h2>
<p>
A unique stand-alone GLSL compiler driver has been added to Mesa.
<p>
<p>
The stand-alone compiler (like a conventional command-line compiler)
is a tool that accepts Shading Language programs and emits low-level
GPU programs.
</p>
<p>
This tool is useful for:
<p>
<ul>
<li>Inspecting GPU code to gain insight into compilation
<li>Generating initial GPU code for subsequent hand-tuning
<li>Debugging the GLSL compiler itself
</ul>
<p>
To build the glslcompiler program (this will be improved someday):
</p>
<pre>
cd src/mesa
make libmesa.a
cd drivers/glslcompiler
make
</pre>
<p>
Here's an example of using the compiler to compile a vertex shader and
emit GL_ARB_vertex_program-style instructions:
</p>
<pre>
glslcompiler --arb --linenumbers --vs vertshader.txt
</pre>
<p>
The output may look similar to this:
</p>
<pre>
!!ARBvp1.0
0: MOV result.texcoord[0], vertex.texcoord[0];
1: DP4 temp0.x, state.matrix.mvp.row[0], vertex.position;
2: DP4 temp0.y, state.matrix.mvp.row[1], vertex.position;
3: DP4 temp0.z, state.matrix.mvp.row[2], vertex.position;
4: DP4 temp0.w, state.matrix.mvp.row[3], vertex.position;
5: MOV result.position, temp0;
6: END
</pre>
<p>
Note that some shading language constructs (such as uniform and varying
variables) aren't expressible in ARB or NV-style programs.
Therefore, the resulting output is not always legal by definition of
those program languages.
</p>
<p>
Also note that this compiler driver is still under development.
Over time, the correctness of the GPU programs, with respect to the ARB
and NV languagues, should improve.
</p>
</BODY>
</HTML>
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