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AMD unleashes open-source 3D code • The Register

AMD has released "the fundamental Linux code" needed to develop open-source 3D-acceleration drivers for its R600 and R700 ATI graphic-processors series.

OpenCL - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

AMD has decided to back OpenCL (and DirectX 11) instead of its now deprecated Close to Metal (aka Stream) framework.[5][6] RapidMind announced their adoption of OpenCL underneath their development platform, in order to support GPUs from multiple vendors with one interface.[7] Nvidia announced on December 9, 2008 to add full support for the OpenCL 1.0 specification to its GPU Computing Toolkit.[8]

If there is one characteristic about the computing world it would be that there are so many idle hands in bedrooms in front of cheap PCs nowadays that, no matter how imaginative you are about new developments, somebody has already put such idle hands to work on it. But these idle hands need foundations, tools to use in their tweaking and hacking. This is why the GCC toolchain and Linux kernel were of such importance a decade ago for the Googles, Yahooes and Facebooks of today. In another turn of the crank, the SETI@home and related "@home" projects took advantage of all those juicy idle CPUs from all those cheap PCs to enable new developments never imagined before. And now there is another opportunity: juicy *G*PUs in combination with juicy CPUs. Why is the announcement by AMD so important? Well, when you release the full 3D documentation for these mighty GPUs, you are providing all those bedrooms with a lot of new tools to play around with. And it seems OpenCL may have been approved in time to lay down a spec that everybody builds on. Will see. Interesting...