Efficiency and Development Effort of OpenCL Interoperability in Vulkan and OpenGL Environments: A Comparative Case Study

Piotr Plebański, Anna Kelm, Marcin Hajder

2025

Abstract

The increasing demand for high-performance computing has led to the exploration of utilizing General-Purpose Graphics Processing Units (GPGPUs) for non-graphical tasks. In this paper, we present a comparative case study of OpenCL interoperability when paired with two widely used graphics APIs: OpenGL and Vulkan. By implementing an ocean wave simulation benchmark – where OpenCL handles compute-intensive tasks and the graphics API manages real-time visualization – we analyze the impact of API selection on both execution performance and development effort. Our results indicate that Vulkan’s low-level control and multi-threaded design deliver marginal performance improvements under minimal rendering loads; however, its increased code verbosity and complex synchronization mechanisms lead to a substantially higher development effort. In contrast, OpenGL, with its more straightforward integration and broad compatibility, provides a practical alternative for compute-first applications. The insights from this case study offer guidance for developers navigating the trade-offs between raw performance and maintainability in GPU-accelerated environments.

Paper Citation

in Harvard Style

Plebański P., Kelm A. and Hajder M. (2025). Efficiency and Development Effort of OpenCL Interoperability in Vulkan and OpenGL Environments: A Comparative Case Study. In Proceedings of the 20th International Conference on Software Technologies - Volume 1: ICSOFT; ISBN 978-989-758-757-3, SciTePress, pages 111-119. DOI: 10.5220/0013529000003964

in Bibtex Style

@conference{icsoft25,
author={Piotr Plebański and Anna Kelm and Marcin Hajder},
title={Efficiency and Development Effort of OpenCL Interoperability in Vulkan and OpenGL Environments: A Comparative Case Study},
booktitle={Proceedings of the 20th International Conference on Software Technologies - Volume 1: ICSOFT},
year={2025},
pages={111-119},
publisher={SciTePress},
organization={INSTICC},
doi={10.5220/0013529000003964},
isbn={978-989-758-757-3},
}

in EndNote Style

TY - CONF

JO - Proceedings of the 20th International Conference on Software Technologies - Volume 1: ICSOFT
TI - Efficiency and Development Effort of OpenCL Interoperability in Vulkan and OpenGL Environments: A Comparative Case Study
SN - 978-989-758-757-3
AU - Plebański P.
AU - Kelm A.
AU - Hajder M.
PY - 2025
SP - 111
EP - 119
DO - 10.5220/0013529000003964
PB - SciTePress