NVIDIA Makes More Hopper, Blackwell Header Files Open-Source (phoronix.com)
(Monday July 21, 2025 @11:30PM (BeauHD)
from the more-the-merrier dept.)
- Reference: 0178433100
- News link: https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/07/21/207245/nvidia-makes-more-hopper-blackwell-header-files-open-source
- Source link: https://www.phoronix.com/news/NVIDIA-Hopper-Blackwell-DMA
NVIDIA has released additional [1]open-source header files for its Blackwell and Hopper GPU architectures , continuing its effort to support open-source drivers like Nouveau/NVK and the NOVA Rust driver. Phoronix reports:
> Last week NVIDIA open-sourced 12k lines of C header files for Blackwell GPUs to help in the open-source driver efforts, namely for Nouveau / NVK and the in-development NOVA Rust driver. On Friday they made public some additional header files for helping in the Blackwell and Hopper open-source driver enablement.
>
> Following the previously-covered open-source header activity, on Friday [2]this commit was pushed to their open-source documentation repository that provides Hopper and Blackwell DMA-copy class header files. [...] In turn the code has already been [3]imported into Mesa Git.
[1] https://www.phoronix.com/news/NVIDIA-Hopper-Blackwell-DMA
[2] https://github.com/NVIDIA/open-gpu-doc/commit/c8607fe576b53ff821ffcf97e7548d2de11c4eaf
[3] https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/mesa/mesa/-/merge_requests/36251
> Last week NVIDIA open-sourced 12k lines of C header files for Blackwell GPUs to help in the open-source driver efforts, namely for Nouveau / NVK and the in-development NOVA Rust driver. On Friday they made public some additional header files for helping in the Blackwell and Hopper open-source driver enablement.
>
> Following the previously-covered open-source header activity, on Friday [2]this commit was pushed to their open-source documentation repository that provides Hopper and Blackwell DMA-copy class header files. [...] In turn the code has already been [3]imported into Mesa Git.
[1] https://www.phoronix.com/news/NVIDIA-Hopper-Blackwell-DMA
[2] https://github.com/NVIDIA/open-gpu-doc/commit/c8607fe576b53ff821ffcf97e7548d2de11c4eaf
[3] https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/mesa/mesa/-/merge_requests/36251
Headers? Better than nothing I guess (Score:2)
Header files only? So we're still at the level of pass this variable and magic happens.
It's better than nothing but it's not exactly super-duper either.
Re: Headers? Better than nothing I guess (Score:4, Informative)
What? You already have the compiled binary. The header means you can interact without the source yet retain ABI correctness and not be buggy.
The magic was before the headers where lots of guessing was done and as they say guess incorrectly in a few places and this fixed all that.
Re: (Score:1)
"The header means you can interact without the source yet retain ABI correctness and not be buggy."
Yup. And if there is a bug then you get to report it and hope the powers that be will deign to fix it.
And if you want to study the source and implement it on another operating system, tough luck.
So, to repeat, it is indeed better than nothing but not exactly super duper.