CODEWITHSUNDEEP
c++cuda
deeex
deeex

Reputation: 21

User defined CUDA code in C++

I am writing a research application that will utilise GPGPU using C++ and CUDA. I want to allow users of the application to be able to tailor the program by writing kernal code that will be executed on the GPU.

My only thought so far is outputting the user code into a .cu file, then calling the platforms compiler to create a Dynamic Library, which can then be loaded at runtime by the host application. Is this viable? Even if it is I'm very concerned that doing this will make my program unstable and a nightmare to make cross-platform.

Any thoughts/alternatives or comments would be greatly appreciated.

Upvotes: 2

Views: 211

Answers (2)

jkysam
jkysam

Reputation: 5779

You could do it, it's viable, but IMO you would need to have a really good reason for allowing users to edit the CUDA kernel. I'm not sure what you have in mind for a user interface, and how the code that the user runs in the CUDA kernel will interface with the outside world, but this could get tricky. It might be better if you pre-implement a set of CUDA kernels and allow users to a known set of parameters for each kernel.

Have you looked at pycuda? It basically implements a similar idea to allow python users to write C++ CUDA kernels inside python applications. Pycuda, provides functionality that helps users integrate their python code with the kernels that they write, so that when they run the python script, the kernel compiles and runs as part of it. I haven't looked at the inner workings of pycuda but I assume that at its core it is doing something similar to what you are trying to achieve. Looking at pycuda might give you an idea of what's needed to write your own implementation.

Upvotes: 1

flolo
flolo

Reputation: 15486

Theoretical it is possible. I would instead recommend OpenCL instead of Cuda. It is not as optimzed as Cuda on Nvidia platform, but is designed to support run time compilation ( every OpenCl runtime driver includes a compiler, that as first step of executing a kernel, compiles it).

Another advantage would be that OpenCL is more portable than Cuda, as OpenCL runs also on ATI (GPU and CPU) and Intel.

Upvotes: 1

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