NVIDIA Corporation has announced that it is open sourcing the
NVIDIA Cg Compiler technology under a nonrestrictive, free license.
Available in August for download from the developer.nvidia.com and
www.cgshaders.org Web sites, this code will contain the parser that
reads the language and creates intermediate code for compilation,
as well as a generic back-end. Together, these components provide
everything required to create optimized Cg compilers for other
platforms and architectures. In addition to the NVIDIA Cg Compiler,
NVIDIA has provided full source code for example shaders in the
NVIDIA Cg Toolkit.
“We’ve experienced enormous interest in Cg since its
introduction,” said Dan Vivoli, vice president of marketing at
NVIDIA. “We’re open sourcing this compiler code to further
accelerate the transition to an era of advanced real-time effects
through Cg.”
“Petty licensing disputes have marred many attempts at industry
wide cooperation,” said John Carmack, co-founder, owner and lead
programmer of id Software, Inc. “NVIDIA’s decision to open source
some of their development work with a very liberal license is a
positive step that I hope other vendors will follow.”
Emerging as the “C” for graphics, the Cg Language Specification
provides developers a complete programming environment that is easy
to use and allows for the fast creation of special effects and
real-time cinematic quality experiences on multiple platforms. By
providing a new level of abstraction, Cg removes the need for
developers to program directly to the graphics hardware assembly
language, and thereby more easily target OpenGL, DirectX 8.0 and
DirectX 9.0.
The industry-standard Cg Language was developed in close
collaboration with Microsoft Corporation and is compatible with
Microsoft’s recently announced High Level Shading Language for
DirectX 9.0. Last month, NVIDIA announced the NVIDIA Cg Toolkit,
comprised of the NVIDIA Cg Compiler 1.0, optimized for DirectX and
OpenGL; the NVIDIA Cg Browser, a prototyping/visualization
environment with a large library of Cg shaders; a CgFX file format;
the Cg Standard Library; and a collection of pre-written Cg shaders
which can be used for a variety of applications, ranging from game
development to digital content creation and computer-aided design.
The NVIDIA Cg Toolkit and other user documentation can be
downloaded at http://developer.nvidia.com/cg.