Just under a year after the last OpenGL version bump, the Khronos Group today announced version 4.4 of the 3D graphics API, ushering in a list of minor changes to the venerable specification. The group also announced a provisional specification for OpenCL version 2.0, the API designed to give developers easy access to the CPU, GPU, and other computing resources depending on which processor will execute their code more efficiently.

The announcement post details the full range of improvements that OpenGL 4.4 and its associated extension bring, but we'll call out two things in particular. First, several functions have been added to ease the porting of Direct3D games into OpenGL, which will be very important to Windows developers seeking to release an OS X or Linux port of their game. Second, the Khronos group has created some OpenGL conformance tests "for the first time since OpenGL 2.0" and is now offering official driver certification. Drivers using OpenGL versions 3.3 and up are eligible for certification; OpenGL versions 4.4 and up will require it. According to the announcement, "this will help reduce differences between multiple vendors’ OpenGL drivers, resulting in enhanced portability for developers."

As for OpenCL 2.0, many of the improvements outlined in the provisional specification are focused on sharing resources between the CPU and GPU—for example, the different processors will be able to take advantage of the same shared virtual memory pool. The Khronos Group would like to finalize OpenCL 2.0 within the next six months.

Both Nvidia and AMD issued statements implying support for the new OpenGL version. Intel's drivers and GPUs typically lag behind by a few versions in OpenGL support, and the recently released Haswell only supports version 4.0 of the spec. The links at the top of the article will point you to all the technical information released about both the new OpenGL and OpenCL specs.