Merge pull request #655 from coldav/colin/add_vulkan_rfc

Added rfc for removing vulkan SDK.

Author: coldav

rfc-0003.md

@@ -0,0 +1,85 @@
+---
+rfc: 3
+title: Removing support for Vulkan
+author: Colin Davidson <[email protected]>
+discussions-to: https://github.com/uxlfoundation/oneapi-construction-kit/discussions/670
+status: draft
+---
+
+<details markdown="1">
+<summary>Table of Contents</summary>
+* Table of Contents
+{:toc}
+</details>
+
+# Abstract
+
+Vulkan API is incomplete and requires installing Vulkan SDK, as well as being
+enabled by default. It has a maintenance and design overhead and is not being
+used, as well as leading to customer confusion. It is proposed that it should be
+removed in its entirety.
+
+# Motivation
+
+Support for Vulkan is incomplete and cannot be used for full Vulkan support. It
+is not being used anywhere at present and leads to requirement on installing the
+Vulkan SDK in order to build OCK. This is also enabled by default and has led to
+confusion among users of OCK, particularly in the requirements for building. It also
+leads to strange dependency such as the mutex which doesn't really belong in the
+`compiler_pipeline` passes.
+
+# Rationale
+
+By removing it altogether this avoids any confusion on the part of the user and
+reduces the maintenance overhead.
+
+# Specification
+
+Remove everything under source/vk and from all documentation that refers to it,
+as well as any github workflow or docker requirements such as installing the
+vulkan SDK. This should also be reflected in the CHANGELOG.md file ready for the
+release notes.
+
+# Backwards Compatibility
+
+Since the Vulkan API will no longer be supported, there will be no backward
+compatibility in this regard. However the default build will still work for the
+OpenCL API, so current customers are unlikely to be affected.
+
+# Security Implications
+
+None
+
+# How to Teach This
+
+This should be added to the next release notes.
+
+# Reference Implementation
+
+The reference implementation is
+[here](https://github.com/uxlfoundation/oneapi-construction-kit/pull/648). Note
+this makes the majority of the changes necessary, but is not complete and there
+are some TODOs to check.
+
+# Rejected Ideas
+
+We could keep it as is but have it disabled by default and only test it in our
+nightly testing. Although this has its merits, the author feels that Vulkan is
+of little benefit as is and we would get an overall lowering of our maintenance
+by dropping it altogether. Having something but not testing it leads to bitrot
+and inability to know whether a change breaks anything. We could do a very
+specific test overnight though as a possibility if we want to keep it disabled
+by default.
+
+# Open Issues
+
+None
+
+# Footnotes
+
+None
+
+# Copyright
+
+This document is placed in the public domain or under the
+CC0-1.0-Universal license, whichever is more permissive.