Originally posted by Korval:
I don’t know what a paint program has to do with arrays of textures. You’re basically talking about a mechanism for switching between multiple textures as needed on the GPU without the overhead of an actual branch operation.
sorry my mistake, a misunderstanding on my part of what it actually does
whens the quarterly newsletter due (seems about time?)
There once was a man from Trinity
Who tried to use gpu_affinity
He found that without words the affair was absurd
So he gave up CG for divinity
He tossed in the sponge for some hot tea and crumpets
Then sprang into action, to the sound of great trumpets
Boldly he tried to make sense of the spec
But with nothing to read he become a wretched wreck
“I need a spec!”, he hooted, he yelped and he hounded
“Hearsay and hunches just leave me confounded!”
“Were I assuaged”, he then mused in his stupor
“Accede I would not, to the foulness of rumor.”
With a glint in his eye he then took to his feet
Gallantly bidding a hasty retreat
Promising henceforth, as he sailed forth to Bimini
To wait 'till tomorrow to again try gpu_affinity.
– Anonymous
Originally posted by Slang:
Are those extensions going to be implemented in ICDs for Windows XP?
Of course!
Cass, can you possibly say something more then “of course”? I mean, we are all nerds, we are dying from curiosity ^^
One of the traditional NVIDIA OpenGL Extensions docs is being readied and should be on developer.nvidia.com Real Soon Now.
We’ll be following up with Cg 2.0 support for the new programmability shortly thereafter.
You think the wait is hard for you… I have been waiting for years to talk about this stuff. 
Actually this is/was a good chance for OpenGL… Bringing the new functionality without need to use Vista…
And cass, thank you very much! Keep up the good work, it’s because of people like you, Mark and Simon I always liked Nvidia! 
One of the traditional NVIDIA OpenGL Extensions docs is being readied and should be on developer.nvidia.com Real Soon Now.
Since you won’t get into time specifics, I’ll ask you this. Will they be there before or after the upcoming double-console launch?
You think the wait is hard for you… I have been waiting for years to talk about this stuff.
Well talk about it, then! At least you won’t have to keep things bottled up, and we’ll know everything we want to. Don’t let that whole, “violating NDA’s and losing your job” thing stop you
Actually this is/was a good chance for OpenGL… Bringing the new functionality without need to use Vista…
Not good enough. The window of opportunity is really only about 1.5-2 years or so; gamers are pretty willing to upgrade machines, which is a perfect time to do an OS upgrade too.
The ARB really needed to get on that new API thing a year earlier. In one year’s time, all of these extensions will be supplanted by the new API (or, rather, it had better be…), and nobody will care.
one question
how much is gonna be available without a gf8800, i mean will cg2.0 open up lots of new possibilities for me with my brand spanking new since yesterday (soon to be outdated) gf7600
btw - pc games bah not worthwhile IMO consoles is where its at, 80% market at the moment + what with the new consoles resembling pcs even more that percentage is only gonna grow
Thanks for the compliment, Zed. Mark, Simon, and I really care about the OpenGL developer community, and I’m glad you’ve noticed. 
Korval, I’ll try to get more detailed info than “Real Soon Now”. I’d rather not say more until I can say something definitive, but there’s no longer any secrecy issue. I’m pretty sure we’ll have the document out ASAP.
It may take reading the extension specs for you to have detailed questions, but when you do, I’ll do my best to answer quickly. If I happen to not be monitoring the thread as quickly as you’d like, feel free to email me at cass@nvidia.com.
As to what Cg 2.0 will open up, it is still a layer above the underlying OpenGL or D3D abstraction. Truly new hardware functionality will be available only where the hardware supports it.
One important exception is in the addition of parameter buffer objects, though. Because GeForce 8 series supports shader parameters from buffer objects, we are going to provide this abstraction to all existing profiles. This should significantly reduce the overhead of parameter updates - and allow the app the update many parameters efficiently with a BufferSubData call.
Likewise, new object model directions with GL3 will enhance the efficiency of Cg runtime calls.
I look forward to hearing what you guys want to do with all the cool new features. It will be a learning process for us - and one that I welcome.
Originally posted by cass:
As to what Cg 2.0 will open up…
One important exception is in the addition of parameter buffer objects, though. Because GeForce 8 series supports shader parameters from buffer objects, we are going to provide this abstraction to all existing profiles. This should significantly reduce the overhead of parameter updates - and allow the app the update many parameters efficiently with a BufferSubData call.
Glad to heard that!
GL_EXT_texture_integer
Might be for using integer texcoords to access texels precicely
GL_NV_gpu_program4
GL_NV_gpu_shader4
Low level and high level. Not sure why the word gpu is there.
GL_EXT_geometry_shader4
****!
GL_NV_transform_feedback
At first I thought this was to transform vertices from one VBO and write to another VBO but the API looks like it’s fr something else.
…well it’s a long list.
NVIDIA developer website has been just updated and here they come:
GeForce 8 Series (G8X) OpenGL Extensions
http://developer.download.nvidia.com/opengl/specs/g80specs.pdf
Release Notes for NVIDIA OpenGL Shading Language Support (Oct 27 2006)
http://developer.download.nvidia.com/opengl/glsl/glsl_release_notes.pdf
nVidia guys thank you very much !!!
I just read through the most interesting new specs, and I really like it 
Great work.
Can’t wait to get my hands on hardware capable of actually doing all that stuff
I’ve just tested NVEmulate. It works!
The only problem is that documentation says to use Release 95 driver, preferably version 97.02 or later. But 97.02 is only for GeForce 8800, and it cannot be installed on my 6800, so I’ve used 96.89 instead. And all extensions are there + GLSL support for geometry shaders.
nVidia guys, thanks again!
Question for cass. With the texture array extension will one be able to do away with the texture mosaic(atlas) and use this extension so one could use filtering other than linear? I am as of now using 16 textures in a single texture atlas, but can’t use tri-linear filtering due to bleeding over issues. And what gains will I see in shadows with the floating depth buffer extension? And yes I will second that Thanks a lot for the OpenGL support from you and Nvidia. That’s why I keep buying NVIDIA hardware!
BTW will there be any GS examples for GLSL on the nvidia developer site?
Originally posted by Mars_9999:
Question for cass. With the texture array extension will one be able to do away with the texture mosaic(atlas) and use this extension so one could use filtering other than linear?
I just read through the spec for it, and it certainly seems like it can be used to replace texture atlases. It appears texture filtering only affects each layer, and not between them.
Originally posted by Mars_9999:
…Thanks a lot for the OpenGL support from you and Nvidia. That’s why I keep buying NVIDIA hardware!
Me too, but the power consumption of their new cards is a little excessive.
Regards
elFarto
Me too, but the power consumption of their new cards is a little excessive.
Not really, look at the reviews when under load it consumes about as much power as ATI’s x1950xtx. So IMO that’s not bad at all for the size of the 8800GTX.
Hi Mars_9999,
Yes, you should be able to use texture arrays as a better form of texture atlas, with trilinear, aniso, etc.
And our devtech group is working on demos of all the new functionality. I can’t say for sure when a GLSL version of geometry programs will show up. The assembly version (compiled from Cg) will probably show up first though.
Thanks -
Cass
This is great news cass. Just made my day. Now looks like I will need to do some magic and drop all the images into a 3D array and then upload at runtime until someone or maybe I will code a utility to pack 2D .tgas into a 3D file format for this extension. Hmmm…