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Question Why shader graph is "abandoned"?

Discussion in 'Graphics Dev Blitz Day 2023 - Q&A' started by Qriva, May 25, 2023.

  1. Qriva

    Qriva

    Joined:
    Jun 30, 2019
    Posts:
    1,307
    I assume shader graph is one of important unity features, nevertheless I feel that it is not actively developed and supported. You may ask why I think so, so I'll give some examples.

    First of all fixes and new features - it's super slow. Even if you check roadmap, you can see that SG has only several rather small features last 2 years or they are exclusive to HDRP. Many of them has been implemented in messy way (if at all). As example "Default values for subgraph inputs", the card clearly says (both text and featured image) I could create default input for UV or world/local space position and stuff like that, meanwhile there is nothing like that, we can just type some "string" as default value overlay - wow. Another example is "Drop-down controls for subgraphs", the interface wasn't even finished properly and the way it's implemented is a bit potatoish, but this one at least works.
    Cycle 2022 finally features full screen blit - it took only 3 years to adress post processing problem, now just one more year and we might see uGui support...
    There are numerous things that can be added or improved (graph performence), many of them already in "under consideration" section, but there is zero visible progress in that area, I can see only bare minimum.

    Second thing - almost zero activity and communication on forum. I must admit I don't read every single post in SG section, but I can see literally several posts from Unity employees per year. I am going to repeat myself, but: I do not expect dedicated person to debug shaders and help every single guy, I expect someone from unity to answer tool/package related questions, reply to feature request and bugs. Just one random example is this thread, forum says it has like 20.000 (unique?) views, it was posted 3 years ago and nobody from unity bothered to adress this to this day, and there are dozens threads like that.

    Sorry for negative tone of this post, but this inactivity is a bit irritating - other numerous sections like UI Toolkit, Physics, VFX Graph has decent or even great support and communication, while shader graph is desert.
    My question then: Is shader graph considered just toy for newbies or some kind of prototyping tool, is that a reason? If not then why it'signored so much? Perhaps there is huge rework going on under the hood and changes are not visible, however this still does not explain forum inactivity - what is the policy regarding forum, who is in charge of it?
     
  2. Onigiri

    Onigiri

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    Aug 10, 2014
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    They just focused on SG 2.0 There is a lot of commits on github about it
     
  3. BenCloward

    BenCloward

    Unity Technologies

    Joined:
    Jul 15, 2021
    Posts:
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    Qriva, Shader Graph is very important to Unity. Our team has been working hard on the next version of the tool. And that, in turn, is why we haven't been able to focus on incremental updates to the current version. We don't like to discuss future updates publicly until they're ready to show - but we're really looking forward to showing what we've been working on.

    And thank you for the invitation to be more active in the forum. I'll give it a shot.
     
  4. Kabinet13

    Kabinet13

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    Jun 13, 2019
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    It's been almost a year. Is this next version still being worked on?
     
  5. BenCloward

    BenCloward

    Unity Technologies

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    Yes.
     
  6. Kabinet13

    Kabinet13

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    Jun 13, 2019
    Posts:
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    Sounds good!

    I assume it might be targeted for Unity 7, but I understand if you can't share a release timeline yet.
     
  7. BenCloward

    BenCloward

    Unity Technologies

    Joined:
    Jul 15, 2021
    Posts:
    143
    In the mean time, I hope you enjoy and take advantage of the new features we've added to the current version of Shader Graph!
    • New sample sets including Node Reference Samples, Feature Examples, and more coming soon.
    • Shader Graph Support for UGUI
    • Keyboard Shortcuts
    • Heatmap Color Mode
     
    marcoantap likes this.