Abstract: Vertices defining a graphics primitive may be processed in homogeneous space and projected into normalized device coordinate space by dividing each coordinate of a vertex by w. When the w coordinate for a vertex is equal to zero, the projected coordinates are set equal to the homogeneous coordinate values. During a viewport transform operation, only the viewport scale is applied rather than applying the viewport scale and viewport bias to produce the vertex in device coordinate space (screen space). Furthermore, when an edge slope is computed for a vertex with a w coordinate equal to zero, the slope is set equal to the vertex in device coordinate space rather than the difference of the two vertices defining the edge. Therefore, a vertex at infinity is correctly positioned avoiding the introduction of visual artifacts.

Abstract: Systems and methods that decompress block compressed texture data may decompress the texture data while simplifying computations to reduce die area while maintaining the required accuracy. Reducing the die area permits more texture data to be decompressed in the same die area compared with a more accurate decompression, thereby increasing texture decompression throughput. Computations are simplified by combining denominators for linear interpolation with format conversion to decompress texture data components compressed using conventional block compression formats.

Abstract: A virtual memory system that maintains a list of pages that are required to be resident in a frame buffer to guarantee the eventual forward progress of a graphics application context running on a graphics system composed of multiple clients. Pages that are required to be in the frame buffer memory are never swapped out of that memory. The required page list can be dynamically sized or fixed sized. A tag file is used to prevent page swapping of a page from the frame buffer that is required to make forward progress. A forward progress indicator signifies that a page faulting client has made forward progress on behalf of a context. The presence of a forward progress indicator is used to clear the tag file, thus enabling page swapping of the previously tagged pages from the frame buffer memory.

Abstract: A method for constructing mapping coordinates for a high-resolution graphics model includes the steps of expanding a projection cage to substantially encompass both a low-resolution graphics model and the high-resolution graphics model, and defining a volume that extends from a polygon of the projection cage through a corresponding polygon of the low-resolution graphics model. The method also includes the steps of determining points within an area on a surface of the high-resolution graphics model defined by an intersection of the volume and the high-resolution model, and, for each point where the corresponding polygon is the closest polygon of the low-resolution graphics model to the point, projecting the point to the corresponding polygon to define a projection point on the corresponding polygon.