High-Level Shader Language

The High-Level Shader Language or High-Level Shading Language (HLSL) is a proprietary <a href="/facts/Shading_language/DyFraJM7">shading language</a> developed by <a href="/facts/Microsoft/nGIDDXdx">Microsoft</a> for the <a href="/facts/Direct3D/WHJ6DTcv">Direct3D</a> 9 <a href="/facts/API/GMlN4vUr">API</a> to augment the <a href="/facts/Shading_language/DyFraJM7">shader assembly</a> language, and went on to become the required shading language for the unified shader model of Direct3D 10 and higher.
HLSL is analogous to the <a href="/facts/GLSL/5yQ3WqTA">GLSL</a> shading language used with the <a href="/facts/OpenGL/xQoMWePr">OpenGL</a> standard. It is very similar to the Nvidia Cg shading language, as it was developed alongside it. Early versions of the two languages were considered identical, only marketed differently. HLSL shaders can enable profound speed and detail increases as well as many <a href="/facts/Special_effects/LHutf1pg">special effects</a> in both 2D and 3D <a href="/facts/Computer_graphics/lapBE8wv">computer graphics</a>.
HLSL programs come in six forms: <a href="/facts/Pixel_shader/qfhkKFwA">pixel shaders</a> (fragment in GLSL), <a href="/facts/Vertex_shader/qfhkKFwA">vertex shaders</a>, <a href="/facts/Geometry_shader/qfhkKFwA">geometry shaders</a>, <a href="/facts/Compute_shader/BxyI4vSf">compute shaders</a>, <a href="/facts/Tessellation_shader/qfhkKFwA">tessellation shaders</a> (Hull and Domain shaders), and <a href="/facts/Ray_tracing_shader/qfhkKFwA">ray tracing shaders</a> (Ray Generation Shaders, Intersection Shaders, Any Hit/Closest Hit/Miss Shaders). A vertex shader is executed for each vertex that is submitted by the application, and is primarily responsible for transforming the vertex from object space to view space, generating texture coordinates, and calculating lighting coefficients such as the vertex's normal, tangent, and bitangent vectors. When a group of vertices (normally 3, to form a triangle) come through the vertex shader, their output position is interpolated to form pixels within its area; this process is known as <a href="/facts/Rasterization/QXfz5t7E">rasterization</a>.
Optionally, an application using a Direct3D 10/11/12 interface and Direct3D 10/11/12 hardware may also specify a geometry shader. This shader takes as its input some vertices of a primitive (triangle/line/point) and uses this data to generate/degenerate (or <a href="/facts/Tessellation_(computer_graphics)/xorfyI4q">tessellate</a>) additional primitives or to change the type of primitives, which are each then sent to the rasterizer.
D3D11.3 and D3D12 introduced Shader Model 5.1 and later 6.0.

High-Level Shader Language open-in-new

High-Level Shader Language