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Does anyone understand why such minor upgrades resulted in a major version bump? Is this some sort of stability check point? Or some other versioning conventi

Does anyone understand why such minor upgrades resulted in a major version bump? Is this some sort of stability check point? Or some other versioning convention?

ibn-python 6y ago
Usually for an API it indicates a breaking change. In this case the removal of some functions which might require refactoring on the consumers end.
- gowld 6y ago
  And to keep users on a hardware upgrade treadmill.
  - llukas 6y ago
    Do you mean removing Pascal support deprecating Maxwell? How long you'd need it to be supported to be satisfied? Even with OSS projects discussions about ending support are not easy.
    - lostmsu 6y ago
      I've got confused for a sec on "removing Pascal support", as some of the 10XX GPUs are only 2 years old. Looks like Pascal stays, and Maxwell is removed indeed (it was deprecated in 10.2).
      - llukas 6y ago
        s/Pascal/Kepler/ sorry.
bigdict 6y ago
I think the page lists the changes since 11.0 RC, not the previous major version.
p1esk 6y ago
It supports a whole new architecture (Ampere) and all the good stuff that comes with it: Multi-Instance GPU partitioning, new number formats (Tfloat32, sparse INT8), 3rd gen of Tensor Cores, and asynchronous copy/asynchronous barriers. These are huge features.
einpoklum 6y ago
Well, I think a new microarchitecture means a major bump. So between that and version bumps to to actual major software features, you get to 11 within 13 years or so. Also, GCC 9.x compatibility may seem minor to some, but is significant for others. I also think there's some C++17 support in kernels - that's something too.
- cjhanks 6y ago
  Ooh, I missed those. Support for C++17 is pretty major. Thanks. Perhaps my memory is fuzzy, I just remember the CUDA 9->10 switch having some significant (but not major) performance and feature changes.