2.3.0 (2019-12-04)

Major release after a year of development in “master” branch and feature branches. Notable new features: supporting Vulkan 1.1, supporting query for memory budget.

Major changes:

  • Added support for Vulkan 1.1.
    • Added member VmaAllocatorCreateInfo::vulkanApiVersion.
    • When Vulkan 1.1 is used, there is no need to enable VK_KHR_dedicated_allocation or VK_KHR_bind_memory2 extensions, as they are promoted to Vulkan itself.
  • Added support for query for memory budget and staying within the budget.
    • Added function vmaGetBudget, structure VmaBudget. This can also serve as simple statistics, more efficient than vmaCalculateStats.
    • By default the budget it is estimated based on memory heap sizes. It may be queried from the system using VK_EXT_memory_budget extension if you use VMA_ALLOCATOR_CREATE_EXT_MEMORY_BUDGET_BIT flag and VmaAllocatorCreateInfo::instance member.
    • Added flag VMA_ALLOCATION_CREATE_WITHIN_BUDGET_BIT that fails an allocation if it would exceed the budget.
  • Added new memory usage options:
    • VMA_MEMORY_USAGE_CPU_COPY for memory that is preferably not DEVICE_LOCAL but not guaranteed to be HOST_VISIBLE.
    • VMA_MEMORY_USAGE_GPU_LAZILY_ALLOCATED for memory that is LAZILY_ALLOCATED.
  • Added support for VK_KHR_bind_memory2 extension:
    • Added VMA_ALLOCATION_CREATE_DONT_BIND_BIT flag that lets you create both buffer/image and allocation, but don't bind them together.
    • Added flag VMA_ALLOCATOR_CREATE_KHR_BIND_MEMORY2_BIT, functions vmaBindBufferMemory2, vmaBindImageMemory2 that let you specify additional local offset and pNext pointer while binding.
  • Added functions vmaSetPoolName, vmaGetPoolName that let you assign string names to custom pools. JSON dump file format and VmaDumpVis tool is updated to show these names.
  • Defragmentation is legal only on buffers and images in VK_IMAGE_TILING_LINEAR. This is due to the way it is currently implemented in the library and the restrictions of the Vulkan specification. Clarified documentation in this regard. See discussion in #59.

Minor changes:

  • Made vmaResizeAllocation function deprecated, always returning failure.
  • Made changes in the internal algorithm for the choice of memory type. Be careful! You may now get a type that is not HOST_VISIBLE or HOST_COHERENT if it's not stated as always ensured by some VMA_MEMORY_USAGE_* flag.
  • Extended VmaReplay application with more detailed statistics printed at the end.
  • Added macros VMA_CALL_PRE, VMA_CALL_POST that let you decorate declarations of all library functions if you want to e.g. export/import them as dynamically linked library.
  • Optimized VmaAllocation objects to be allocated out of an internal free-list allocator. This makes allocation and deallocation causing 0 dynamic CPU heap allocations on average.
  • Updated recording CSV file format version to 1.8, to support new functions.
  • Many additions and fixes in documentation. Many compatibility fixes for various compilers and platforms. Other internal bugfixes, optimizations, updates, refactoring...

2.2.0 (2018-12-13)

Major release after many months of development in “master” branch and feature branches. Notable new features: defragmentation of GPU memory, buddy algorithm, convenience functions for sparse binding.

Major changes:

  • New, more powerful defragmentation:
    • Added structure VmaDefragmentationInfo2, functions vmaDefragmentationBegin, vmaDefragmentationEnd.
    • Added support for defragmentation of GPU memory.
    • Defragmentation of CPU memory now uses memmove, so it can move data to overlapping regions.
    • Defragmentation of CPU memory is now available for memory types that are HOST_VISIBLE but not HOST_COHERENT.
    • Added structure member VmaVulkanFunctions::vkCmdCopyBuffer.
    • Major internal changes in defragmentation algorithm.
    • VmaReplay: added parameters: --DefragmentAfterLine, --DefragmentationFlags.
    • Old interface (structure VmaDefragmentationInfo, function vmaDefragment) is now deprecated.
  • Added buddy algorithm, available for custom pools - flag VMA_POOL_CREATE_BUDDY_ALGORITHM_BIT.
  • Added convenience functions for multiple allocations and deallocations at once, intended for sparse binding resources - functions vmaAllocateMemoryPages, vmaFreeMemoryPages.
  • Added function that tries to resize existing allocation in place: vmaResizeAllocation.
  • Added flags for allocation strategy: VMA_ALLOCATION_CREATE_STRATEGY_BEST_FIT_BIT, VMA_ALLOCATION_CREATE_STRATEGY_WORST_FIT_BIT, VMA_ALLOCATION_CREATE_STRATEGY_FIRST_FIT_BIT, and their aliases: VMA_ALLOCATION_CREATE_STRATEGY_MIN_MEMORY_BIT, VMA_ALLOCATION_CREATE_STRATEGY_MIN_TIME_BIT, VMA_ALLOCATION_CREATE_STRATEGY_MIN_FRAGMENTATION_BIT.

Minor changes:

  • Changed behavior of allocation functions to return VK_ERROR_VALIDATION_FAILED_EXT when trying to allocate memory of size 0, create buffer with size 0, or image with one of the dimensions 0.
  • VmaReplay: Added support for Windows end of lines.
  • Updated recording CSV file format version to 1.5, to support new functions.
  • Internal optimization: using read-write mutex on some platforms.
  • Many additions and fixes in documentation. Many compatibility fixes for various compilers. Other internal bugfixes, optimizations, refactoring, added more internal validation...

2.1.0 (2018-09-10)

Minor bugfixes.

2.1.0-beta.1 (2018-08-27)

Major release after many months of development in “development” branch and features branches. Many new features added, some bugs fixed. API stays backward-compatible.

Major changes:

  • Added linear allocation algorithm, accessible for custom pools, that can be used as free-at-once, stack, double stack, or ring buffer. See “Linear allocation algorithm” documentation chapter.
    • Added VMA_POOL_CREATE_LINEAR_ALGORITHM_BIT, VMA_ALLOCATION_CREATE_UPPER_ADDRESS_BIT.
  • Added feature to record sequence of calls to the library to a file and replay it using dedicated application. See documentation chapter “Record and replay”.
    • Recording: added VmaAllocatorCreateInfo::pRecordSettings.
    • Replaying: added VmaReplay project.
    • Recording file format: added document “docs/Recording file format.md”.
  • Improved support for non-coherent memory.
    • Added functions: vmaFlushAllocation, vmaInvalidateAllocation.
    • nonCoherentAtomSize is now respected automatically.
    • Added VmaVulkanFunctions::vkFlushMappedMemoryRanges, vkInvalidateMappedMemoryRanges.
  • Improved debug features related to detecting incorrect mapped memory usage. See documentation chapter “Debugging incorrect memory usage”.
    • Added debug macro VMA_DEBUG_DETECT_CORRUPTION, functions vmaCheckCorruption, vmaCheckPoolCorruption.
    • Added debug macro VMA_DEBUG_INITIALIZE_ALLOCATIONS to initialize contents of allocations with a bit pattern.
    • Changed behavior of VMA_DEBUG_MARGIN macro - it now adds margin also before first and after last allocation in a block.
  • Changed format of JSON dump returned by vmaBuildStatsString (not backward compatible!).
    • Custom pools and memory blocks now have IDs that don't change after sorting.
    • Added properties: “CreationFrameIndex”, “LastUseFrameIndex”, “Usage”.
    • Changed VmaDumpVis tool to use these new properties for better coloring.
    • Changed behavior of vmaGetAllocationInfo and vmaTouchAllocation to update allocation.lastUseFrameIndex even if allocation cannot become lost.

Minor changes:

  • Changes in custom pools:
    • Added new structure member VmaPoolStats::blockCount.
    • Changed behavior of VmaPoolCreateInfo::blockSize = 0 (default) - it now means that pool may use variable block sizes, just like default pools do.
  • Improved logic of vmaFindMemoryTypeIndex for some cases, especially integrated GPUs.
  • VulkanSample application: Removed dependency on external library MathFu. Added own vector and matrix structures.
  • Changes that improve compatibility with various platforms, including: Visual Studio 2012, 32-bit code, C compilers.
    • Changed usage of “VK_KHR_dedicated_allocation” extension in the code to be optional, driven by macro VMA_DEDICATED_ALLOCATION, for compatibility with Android.
  • Many additions and fixes in documentation, including description of new features, as well as “Validation layer warnings”.
  • Other bugfixes.

2.0.0 (2018-03-19)

A major release with many compatibility-breaking changes.

Notable new features:

  • Introduction of VmaAllocation handle that you must retrieve from allocation functions and pass to deallocation functions next to normal VkBuffer and VkImage.
  • Introduction of VmaAllocationInfo structure that you can retrieve from VmaAllocation handle to access parameters of the allocation (like VkDeviceMemory and offset) instead of retrieving them directly from allocation functions.
  • Support for reference-counted mapping and persistently mapped allocations - see vmaMapMemory, VMA_ALLOCATION_CREATE_MAPPED_BIT.
  • Support for custom memory pools - see VmaPool handle, VmaPoolCreateInfo structure, vmaCreatePool function.
  • Support for defragmentation (compaction) of allocations - see function vmaDefragment and related structures.
  • Support for “lost allocations” - see appropriate chapter on documentation Main Page.

1.0.1 (2017-07-04)

  • Fixes for Linux GCC compilation.
  • Changed “CONFIGURATION SECTION” to contain #ifndef so you can define these macros before including this header, not necessarily change them in the file.

1.0.0 (2017-06-16)

First public release.