1.1. The dawn of OpenCL

The x86 architecture enjoys a dominant position in the world of personal computing, but there is no prevailing architecture in the fields of graphical and high-performance computing. Despite their common purpose, there is little similarity between Nvidia’s line of Fermi processors, AMD’s line of Evergreen processors, and IBM’s Cell Broadband Engine. Each of these devices has its own instruction set, and before OpenCL, if you wanted to program them, you had to learn three different languages.

Enter Apple. For those of you who have been living as recluses, Apple Inc. produces an insanely popular line of consumer electronic products: the iPhone, the iPad, the iPod, and the Mac line of personal computers. But Apple doesn’t make processors for the Mac computers. Instead, it selects devices from other companies. If Apple chooses a graphics processor from Company A for its new gadget, then Company A will see a tremendous rise in market share and developer interest. This is why everyone is so nice to Apple.