HIGH-LEVEL GPU PROGRAMMING Domain-specific optimization and inference

When writing computer software one is often forced to balance the need for high run-time performance with high programmer productivity. By using a high-level language it is often possible to cut development times, but this typically comes at the cost of reduced run-time performance. Using a lower-level language, programs can be made very efficient but at the cost of increased development time. Real-time computer graphics is an area where there are very high demands on both performance and visual quality. Typically, large portions of such applications are written in lower-level languages and also rely on dedicated hardware, in the form of programmable graphics processing units (GPUs), for handling computationally de-manding rendering algorithms. These GPUs are parallel stream processors, specialized towards computer graphics, that have computational performance more than a mag-nitude higher than corresponding CPUs. This has revolutionized computer graphics and also led to GPUs being used to solve more general numerical problems, such as fluid and physics simulation, protein folding, image processing, and databases. Un