On 10/26/2012 12:19 PM, dave wrote: > On Fri, 2012-10-26 at 11:36 -0400, Kent A. Reed wrote: >> <blah blah blah> >> >> On the plus side, I expect someday to see someone successfully exploit >> the GPU to offload some of our CNC calculations from the CPU. The >> horsepower is there; it's a matter of timing. >> >> Regards, >> Kent >> > Hi Kent, > > Offloading to the GPU is a most obvious approach ....in the manner of > math profs with chalk in the right hand and the eraser in the > left ..."it is obvious that". <grin>
I always liked the Sydney Harris cartoon. http://www.sciencecartoonsplus.com/images/miracle_sharris.gif > Most of the present day GPU's wouldn't even strain handling motion the > problem is simply that processors (GPU) are a moving target and > reinventing the wheel with each new generation of GPU would be a pain to > the most dedicated programmer. Agreed, this makes the problem hard, but not unsolvable, I think. In general form, the hardware shaders are pretty well understood (after all, Microsoft manages to keep DirectX alive). I can think of several programming techniques (and I'm not up to date) for separating the what from the how so we could port more easily from one GPU to another. I have lost touch with a fellow NIST'er (also retired) who was exploring this in the context of solving massive sets of coupled differential equations that arise in analyses of heat- and mass- transfer in practical machines and systems. Too bad we can't make this a Google "Summer of Code" project. > Now if one is bright enough (don't look > at me) to build an engine that does the development the the strain gets > lowered some. > Sharing a video chip between motion and display would certainly present > some interesting problems unless one has two boards and dedicates one to > motion. Who said "sharing"? Remember, I'm the guy who likes to run headless systems so why not take advantage of the built-in GPU? Besides, a second graphics card is small beer these days---always assuming there's a spare slot :-( > Along different lines I keep waiting for someone to write a driver > between linuxcnc and something like mesa's softdmc. > > Both of these rather break the original philosophy of emc/linuxcnc but > nothing in technology is really static. Fortunately, we---the LinuxCNC community---have been lucky finding folks willing to try new things. > Nomex suit is donned. Have at it. Flames? Nah. Smile, maybe. > > Dave Regards, Kent ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ The Windows 8 Center In partnership with Sourceforge Your idea - your app - 30 days. Get started! http://windows8center.sourceforge.net/ what-html-developers-need-to-know-about-coding-windows-8-metro-style-apps/ _______________________________________________ Emc-users mailing list Emc-users@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/emc-users
