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Comment by keldaris | Hacker News Reader

Given the extent to which real-time fluid simulation consists of GPU computation, is there anything that makes Odin particularly suited to that domain apart from the basic requirement of control over memory allocation and alignment?

I'm more on the scientific side of CFD (so CUDA more so than shaders), but always interested in improving upon the kind of orthodox C++ I usually write.

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Odin doesn't have CUDA-like GPU interoperability, so the benefits are going to be purely client-side. If you were working in say OpenCL + C the benefits are more obvious, with CUDA you're not going to get an analogous experience.

I would say in my experience that Odin is definitely preferable as a client language for the simple reason that it's a nicer systems programming environment than other languages, but it's not (at least right now, future developments could always change this) equipped to run native GPU code.

Things like SPIR-V and "shader ASM" open up some interesting possibilities once the custom backend is implemented, but the complexity of integrating GPU execution means making it a first-class feature it probably unlikely.

As most of the heavy lifting in Embergen is done on the GPU via shading languages the main benefit in using Odin isn't necessarily anything to do with memory control compared to the usefulness of its remaining feature set. The simplicity of the language and its ergonomic set of features does a good job at reducing friction and it is a joy to program in. Simply not being bogged down in all the complexities of C++ in all their forms, nor being held back by the arcane annoyances of C is quite refreshing.

is 'orthodox c++' a thing? i feel like there is a joke somewhere there...

It's a reference to [1] and a mindset arguably most common in the gamedev world that emphasizes simplicity, pragmatism and performance (including compile time performance) over many aspects of "modern C++". I've found it useful and productive, YMMV.

[1] https://gist.github.com/bkaradzic/2e39896bc7d8c34e042b

That's an interesting (and I think worthwhile) read! Just how much it upset the denizens of r/cpp[1] is a sight to behold:

> This starts ridiculously, then it gets worse

...

> looks like a solid way to produce abysmal quality code

...

> just learn the fucking language like everybody else

...

> The trolls from r/javascript are brigading us again It seems

1: https://www.reddit.com/r/cpp/comments/41b3o3/orthodox_c/

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