glDispatchCompute

glDispatchCompute is a function in the OpenGL programming interface used to launch compute shaders. Compute shaders are a powerful feature introduced in OpenGL 4.3 that allow for general-purpose parallel computation on the GPU, distinct from traditional graphics rendering pipelines.

The glDispatchCompute function takes three unsigned integer arguments: num_groups_x, num_groups_y, and num_groups_z. These arguments define the dimensions of a grid of work groups. A work group is a collection of threads that can cooperate and share data. When glDispatchCompute is called, the GPU launches num_groups_x * num_groups_y * num_groups_z work groups. Each work group, in turn, executes a specified number of invocations, determined by the local work group size defined within the compute shader itself.

This function is the primary mechanism for initiating general-purpose GPU computation tasks. Developers can use it for a wide range of applications, including physics simulations, image processing, data analysis, and artificial intelligence computations, leveraging the massive parallelism of the GPU to accelerate these tasks. The output of these computations can then be accessed by subsequent rendering passes or other compute operations.