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Posted by Jaso1024 12 hours ago

Show HN: A game where you build a GPU(jaso1024.com)
Thought the resources for GPU arch were lacking, so here we are
436 points | 125 commentspage 2
john_strinlai 11 hours ago|
as a learning resource, it would be great it acronyms were expanded at least once. nmos, pmos, gnd, vdd all in the first 5 seconds or so, and i didnt see anywhere that actually said what those stood for

otherwise, looks polished and fills in a nice niche!

II2II 11 hours ago||
There's the info boxes that it could be added to, that way it is always available at a mouse click.

That said, I'm not sure how useful expanding most of the acronyms would be. Names like Negative/Positive Metal Oxide Semiconductor aren't exactly self-explanatory, Vdd isn't really an acronym, etc..

Jaso1024 11 hours ago||
I had an arc 0 where it went through some of these topics more in depth and explained them, deleted it b/c i couldn't get the UI to look right. I've pushed a bandaid that should fix this, but ill bring in arc 0 (it seems this is a popular request) after polishing it (ill also make it optional)
npinsker 11 hours ago||
Great game! For learning, might be nice to see some commentary or example (model) solutions after beating a level.
Jaso1024 11 hours ago|
Yeah, I've actually been planning to add this in, might have gemini look at your circuit config and give its opinion, alongside dynamic hints
xmprt 9 hours ago||
This is super cool but part of me wishes I could skip to the later levels rather than redo college homework from a decade ago. Maybe that ruins the fun but also slogging through the early levels (especially when the UI is a bit rough around the edges and doesn't support copy paste) isn't fun either.
vibe_that_works 9 hours ago||
That was great fun, an interactive refresher on my EE studies. Thank you so much for creating it.

If anybody can create something similarly interactive, educational and hands-on for microbiology or robotics, I am happy to sponsor your cost.

hristov 6 hours ago||
Ok you have put a lot of work in this and it looks impressive. But it needs a serious balance change. It is far too hard. Currently this may work as a brain teaser for people in the industry or people with computer engineering degrees, but it wont bring any fresh young minds into the industry. The fresh young minds will be scared off.

Teaching is challenging stuff. You have to step out of your current mindset and think with the mind of someone that sees this stuff for the first time. It is not easy to make things look easy and simple. Specifically, I think you need a lot more exploration about cmos logic, about how one side pulls the output up or the other side pulls the output down but they are never on at the same time, about how they effectively amplify the result so the output does not have to depend on the power of the input, etc. Perhaps you can try to have people design things in NMOS logic than in PMOS logic and then combine the two to make a CMOS design to see how they complement each other.

But I do not want to discourage you. This is a very promising start and you should continue if you have the time.

Also, the timed answers -- are you kidding me? The time is waaay too short. And you fail all if you fail a single answer. Oh what is 0xDE in decimal, all I have to do is multiply 16 by 13 and add 14 to that. In my head in 12 seconds. Also the time is not sufficient for filling out truth tables, especially with a laptop trackpad. I was able to pass the truth tables, but gave up on hexracing.

Ok and here are some more specific issues.

-The wires seem to snap in position in a way that they superimpose each other so it becomes very difficult to see what your circuit is doing.

- truth tables seem to be bugged. If you have more inputs than the gate whose truth table you are looking at, sometimes it will generate a fictitious truth table with extra inputs. Thus, some times i get a NOT truth table that has two inputs.

- the ground element should have its connection circle on the top, not the bottom. I realized that you can rotate by pressing R, but the site does not mention that anywhere.

Jaso1024 3 hours ago|
lol, yeah, the time should be fixed though rn I think? depending on what level of difficulty you select in the racer game. The wiring is something I've been struggling with, working on making it better.

I intentionally made it s.t the truth tables are based on not just the input into the node, but based on all actual inputs to the node (so if you have additional processing on input x and y, itll show you the not w/ respect to input x and y and not just the immediate input).

will add a rotating cue in the next update

hristov 2 hours ago||
Yes the timing is fixed. Appreciate the quick changes. Good luck!
brynnbee 8 hours ago||
Huge fan of this! I love learning-by-doing and this captures that cycle perfectly.
zapkyeskrill 10 hours ago||
Any easy way to make this usable on mobile? In portrait mode things are unreadable, zoom and scrolling do not work. Landscape is even worse as everything is out of view (and zoom/scroll do not work).
Jaso1024 10 hours ago|
Yeah, i'm planning to make it mobile compatible in the coming day(s), i didn't plan for this to be mobile originally, so it kind of sucks on phone
iandev 9 hours ago||
I'm confused about a difference in the NMOS and PMOS. The scenario I'm confused about is when the source is VDD and the drain is connected to GND and output.

For the PMOS, the output toggles between 1 and 0 (opposite the gate) as expected. However, for the NMOS, the output is always 0.

I don't understand why GND pulls VDD down to 0 for the NMOS, but not the PMOS.

Jaso1024 9 hours ago|
Oh, the drain should only be connected to the output, not drain aswell (irl this would kill one's chip, I'll add a feature to show short-circuiting). on pmos the source should be vdd, on nmos the source should be gnd (this doesn't apply for some later levels, but does for earlier ones).
Jaso1024 9 hours ago||
Hi everyone, commenting to address feedback:

- Made timed minigames optional (e.g. binary tables)

- Added 7 (optional) intro levels to walk through pmos and nmos transistors

- Fixed the bug in the capacitor levels

- Changed editor bg to use dots instead of lines to fix wire confusion

sheiyei 9 hours ago|
Layout appears unusable on my phone on Firefox Android (both portrait and landscape). Necessary elements seem to get hidden behind others. Not sure if I'm even supposed to be able to play it without kB&m though lol :)
Jaso1024 9 hours ago||
Yeah, its not mobile-ready atm, ill push an update to make it mobile-friendly in the next day or so
unsnap_biceps 9 hours ago|
The truth tables are way too hard for me. I need time to think and the 10 seconds is way too fast. If this is intended to be a teaching resource, avoid timers IMHO. It needlessly excludes people.
Jaso1024 9 hours ago|
makes sense, idk if i want to remove times altogether (i personally found it fun + i want the game to be fun for all levels of familiarity), but ill add a modal to explicitly select difficulty level at the start of the racer game, i def agree w/ u overall
testaccount28 7 hours ago||
please just let me skip it. why am i doing homework in the middle of a game?
Jaso1024 3 hours ago||
lol, i made them skippable earlier to day, if u refresh now it should let you skip them
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