Handling Runtime Errors

If you plan to get kernel binaries with clGetProgramInfo(CL_PROGRAM_BINARIES) and save them to disk or other long term storage device for later reuse, you must handle the possibility that the clBuildProgram function will fail with error CL_INVALID_BINARY when you try to reuse the saved binary later. If this happens, your application should:

1. Create a new OpenCL program by calling the clCreateProgramWithSource function, passing the OpenCL C source code in the strings parameter.

2. Recompile the program using the clBuildProgram function.

3. Extract the new binary using clGetProgramInfo(CL_PROGRAM_BINARIES) and replace the old one on disk.

Avoiding Build Errors

Binary OpenCL kernel images saved to disk may also fail to build for the current machine if the image was created by another machine and saved to a network volume, if the user installs new hardware such as an additional GPU or replaces existing hardware, or changes some hardware settings (for example, turns on and off the discrete graphics card on MacBook Pro with both discrete and integrated GPUs).

The best way to avoid shipping binary OpenCL code is to use the offline OpenCL compiler to produce LLVM bitcode.

To generate LLVM IR (on OS X v10.8), compile a bitcode file for each of the architectures available: i368 32b, x86_64 bit, and 32b GPU. For each architecture, call the openclc compiler:

/System/Library/Frameworks/OpenCL.framework/Libraries/openclc -Os -arch i386 -emit-llvm-bc clFileName -o outputFileName

/System/Library/Frameworks/OpenCL.framework/Libraries/openclc -Os -arch x86_64 -emit-llvm-bc clFileName -o outputFileName

/System/Library/Frameworks/OpenCL.framework/Libraries/openclc -Os -arch gpu_32 -emit-llvm-bc clFileName -o outputFileName

The output file will be an LLVM bit-code object file, which can be used with the clCreateProgramWithBinary function.