Blade

gfx, luminance, vulkano, wgpu, rafx, sierra …
Yet another graphics library?

Motivation

Case: Rusty Vangers

• 15 pipelines
• 7 pipeline layouts, 8 bind group layouts
• .. after removing GPU physics

Motivation: GPU evolves

Lots workloads where CPU costs are small:

• AZDO (term from late OpenGL)
• compute/ML workloads
• Ray Tracing

Why not wgpu/hal?

Constraints…

Lean

State tracking

No per-object state. No image layout transitions.
Global barriers between passes.

if let mut pass_encoder = encoder.compute() {
    let mut pipeline_encoder = pass_encoder.with(pipeline);
    pipeline_encoder.dispatch(..);
}

State tracking: example

1. Create a resource
2. Use in a compute/render/transder pass
3. Submit the command encoder.

Binding model

No layouts. No descriptor sets.
No uniform buffers, just plain data.

Binding model: define group

#[derive(bytemuck::Pod)]
struct MyUniformStruct {
    data: u32
}
#[derive(blade::ShaderData)]
struct Foo {
    texture: blade::TextureView,
    uniform: MyUniformStruct,
}

Binding model: pipeline creation

let foo_layout = <Foo as blade::ShaderData>::layout();
context.create_pipeline(blade::ComputePipelineDescriptor {
  data_layouts: &[&foo_layout],
});

Binding model: binding

pass.bind(0, &Foo {
    texture: my_texture_view,
    uniform: MyUniformStruct { // plain data
        data: 1,
    },
});

Binding model: thoughts

Makes prototyping a breeze!

Was BG/BGL/PL a design mistake in WebGPU?

Lean: code size

Disclaimer: Blade is much incomplete!

But is it fast?

Can do around 20K draw calls per frame on a low-end laptop.

Mean

• Totally unsafe: use at your own risk.
• No tools: ask your local GPU vendor.
• Incomplete: customize for your needs.

Mean: shortcuts

Who needs vertex buffers, anyway?

One context - one window.

Mean: no contract

All libraries: we got you!
Blade: bring your own maintainer

See What it feels like to be an open-source maintainer

Ergonomics

Resource objects: light and copyable.

pub struct Buffer {
    raw: vk::Buffer,
    memory_handle: usize,
    mapped_data: *mut u8,
}

Context: Has everything, internally synchronized.

API: Shaders

Validated(*) WGSL modules.
Without resource binding decorations!

var sprite_texture: texture_2d<f32>;
var sprite_sampler: sampler;

TL;DR: why use Blade?

Why not use Blade?

Demo & Questions

https://github.com/kvark/blade