Interpreter for simplified programming of graphics processor units in general purpose programming languages

U.S. Patent 7,598,953, Filed November 5, 2004.  Although GPUs have been harnessed to solve non-graphics problems, these solutions are not widespread because GPUs remain difficult to program. Instead, an interpreter simplifies the task of programming a GPU by providing language constructs such as a set of data types and operations that are more familiar to non-graphics programmers. The interpreter maps these familiar language constructs to the more difficult graphics programming languages such as DirectX, OpenGL, Cg, and/or HLSL.