Tellusim Core SDK

December 30, 2025 · View on GitHub

Tellusim Core SDK is the foundational layer of the Tellusim Engine, providing low-level functionality for high-performance graphics, compute, and application development across multiple platforms and devices. It offers a unified C++ API designed to abstract hardware and OS differences, enabling developers to write portable and scalable applications in graphics, simulation, visualization, and AI.

The SDK includes comprehensive support for meshes, images, user interfaces, and GPU-accelerated algorithms such as radix sort, bounding volume hierarchies (BVH), fast Fourier transforms (FFT), and GPU-driven computational graph framework for machine learning and advanced data processing.

In addition to C++, the SDK provides bindings and interoperability for other languages such as C#, Rust, Swift, Python, Java, and JavaScript, making it suitable for use in native mobile and desktop applications as well as game and graphics engines.

Happy coding, and have fun creating with Tellusim!

Getting Started

Documentation and Support

Platforms

Please choose the correct branch for your platform:

Platform	Branch
Windows x64	Windows x64 Branch
Windows arm64	Windows arm64 Branch
Linux x64	Linux x64 Branch
Linux arm64	Linux arm64 Branch
macOS x64	macOS x64 Branch
macOS arm64	macOS arm64 Branch
Android	Android Branch
iOS	iOS Branch
tvOS	tvOS Branch
Web	Web Branch

Licensing

Tellusim Core SDK is free for educational use by students, teachers, and academic institutions.
Tellusim Core SDK is free for non-commercial research by individuals or non-profit organizations.
Tellusim Core SDK is free for individuals and companies with total annual revenue under USD $200,000.
Tellusim Core SDK is free for evaluation, testing, learning, and other non-commercial experimentation.
Tellusim Core SDK is free for open-source, non-commercial projects distributed under OSI-approved licenses (MIT, BSD, GPL, LGPL, or Apache 2.0), provided such projects generate no revenue and do not sell, license, or otherwise monetize software built with the Tellusim Core SDK.
Tellusim Core SDK may be redistributed unmodified, along with binaries built with it, as part of free or open-source projects, provided the SDK itself is not sold, sublicensed, or rented for a fee.
Any other use, including production deployment, commercial projects, or client-facing demonstrations, requires a Tellusim Commercial License.

For full license terms, see the Tellusim Core SDK LICENSE

For inquiries, visit: Tellusim Services

Graphics

Clustered Lights

Forward shading with 16384 dynamic lights. This algorithm is compatible with deferred shading and transparent objects.

Meshlet Render

A massive meshlets rendering example with Mesh Shader for hardware and Compute Shader for software rasterization.
'1' activates Instancing mode.
'2' activates Mesh Shader mode.
'3' activates Compute rasterization mode.

Mesh RayTracing

Traversal class for the simple raytracing pipeline access. Vulkan or Direct3D12 API is required.

Mesh RayQuery

Ray Query raytracing of animated scene. Vulkan, Direct3D12, or Metal API is required.
'1' activates Fragment Shader raytracing (if available).

Hardware RayTracing

Hardware accelerated RayTracing of animated objects.

Compute RayTracing

Compute Shader RayTracing of animated objects.

Hardware RayTracing

Hardware accelerated RayTracing of high-polygonal objects.

Compute RayTracing

Compute Shader RayTracing of high-polygonal objects.

Compute Traversal

Compute Shader BVH tree traversal is a key technique in GPU-driven rendering that provides significantly better performance than CPU-based culling.

JPEG Decoder

The DecoderJPEG provides GPU-accelerated JPEG decoding functionality.

Cube Filter

The CubeFilter interface performs real-time Cube texture filtration.

Separable Filter

The SeparableFilter interface helps to create different separable filters like Gaussian, Sobel, Box, and custom weights.

Indirect Draw

Drawing massive amount of quads using different indirect rendering techniques.

Geometry Shader

Rendering massive amount of boxes with Geometry Shaders.
'1' activates Vertex Shader mode.
'2' activates Mesh Shader mode (if available).

Tessellation Shader

Quadrilateral tessellation with Control + Evaluate or Mesh Shaders.
'1' activates Mesh Shader tessellation mode (if available).

Ordered Independent Transparency

Ordered Independent Transparency with atomic buffer operations from the fragment shader.

Hardware Ray Tracing Shadows

Hardware raytracing shadows with simple deferred shading. An API with Ray Query support is required.

Software Ray Tracing Shadows

Software raytracing shadows with simple deferred shading. Compatible with all APIs.

Percentage Closer Filtering Shadow Map

PCF Shadow Maps provides shadow with variable penumbra size based on the distance between the shadow caster and receiver.

Exponential Shadow Maps

Exponential Shadow Maps provides noise-free shadows with a fixed performance cost and constant penumbra size.

Parallax 2D

Parallax occlusion mapping with self-shadowing for the mesh geometry.

Parallax Cube

Parallax occlusion mapping with self-shadowing for the analytical sphere.

Mesh Tangent Basis

Mesh tangent basis renormalization at the Fragment Shader. Mesh class can re-create normal and tangent vectors.

Mesh Model

MeshModel class creates a rendering model representation for the input Mesh or MeshGeometry with a specified Pipeline layout.
It is possible to inherit MeshModel class and combine multiple meshes into the single Buffer.

Mesh Morphing

This is a basic morph mesh animation example. AttributeIndex provides a stable mapping between source and optimized vertices. Texel Buffer acts as a workaround for platforms that lack compute shader support.

Mesh Skinning

This is a basic skinned mesh animation example. Mesh classes give comprehensive access to all mesh data, including Nodes, Animations, Materials, Cameras, and Lights.

Multi Window

Rendering scene into multiple borderless windows.

Line Rendering

Simple antialiased line rendering. The Vertex shader creates a screen-aligned billboard, and the fragment shader calculates the distance to the line.

Platform

Platform Precision

Performance and precision difference between 16-bit, 32-bit, and 64-bit floating formats.
'1' activates 64-bit precision.
'2' activates 16-bit precision.

Platform Bindless

This example demonstrates bindless Buffer and Texture resources indexed by InstanceIndex. Vulkan, Direct3D12, or Metal API is required.

Platform TextureTable

TextureTable is an interface for an unlimited number of bindless textures that can be accessed from any shader by uniform or non-uniform index. Vulkan, Direct3D12, or Metal API is required.

Platform Texel

Texel buffer provides cached buffer access that is compatible with OpenGLES platform. Moreover, it can work faster than the Storage buffer in some scenarios.

Platform Texture

Dynamic 3D texture created with SIMD CPU instructions.

Platform Command

Command class for basic rendering. Depth Cube texture for omnidirectional shadow map.

Platform Tracing

Hardware accelerated raytracing shadows. An API with Ray Query support is required.

Platform Compute

Compute class for simple compute shader texture generation.

Platform Fence

Multi-GPU N-body simulation with Fence synchronization. A shared buffer is used for data exchange between GPUs.

Platform Fence

Multi-GPU synchronization with fences and semaphores.

Platform Sparse

This example shows how sparse textures allow handling very large textures by allocating only the needed tiles in GPU memory

Platform Mapped

This example shows how Vulkan can map files into GPU buffers, allowing the GPU to read from and write to files directly without extra copying.

Platform Formats

This example shows how mixed texture formats can reduce video memory consumption. Image format conversion is performed by the Image interface.

Platform Dynamic

A single-thread dynamic geometry rendering can provide more than 100M triangles per second rate.

Platform Clip Planes

Vertex Shader clip distance output is useful for arbitrary geometry culling.

Platform Stencil Buffer

Constructive Solid Geometry with the Stencil Buffer. This algorithm is compatible with procedural geometry.

Platform Fusion

Fusion API allows replicating all commands and resources across multiple physical or logical devices. It dramatically simplifies the development of apps for multi-GPU or multi-channel rendering.

Platform Layers

Demonstrates multilayer rendering where the target layer is selected dynamically in the Vertex Shader, Geometry Shader, or Geometry Passthrough Shader.

Platform Viewports

Demonstrates multi-viewport rendering with dynamic viewport selection in the Vertex Shader, Geometry Shader, or Geometry Passthrough Shader.

Platform Samplers

Demonstrates various texture sampler configuration modes.

Barycentric Coordinates

Build-in barycentric coordinate input is available in Vulkan, Direct3D12, and Metal APIs.

Multi Draw Indirect

This example performs MDI rendering of different objects.

Vertex Attribute Divisor

This example demonstrates the use of a vertex attribute divisor to fetch per-draw data.

MSAA Alpha Test

MSAA-compatible alpha test in comparison to hardware alpha to coverage.

Input Blending Color

Blending color parameter defines uniform value for blending operations.

Multisample Antialiasing

This example performs AA line rendering into MSAA texture.

Platform Preprocessor

This example demonstrates how to use the #include preprocessor directive to declare generic functions.

Platform Texture Samples

Writing and reading individual multisample texture samples with active Pipeline sample write mask.

Conservative Rasterization

Hardware conservative rasterization.

Cooperative Matrix (Tensor Cores)

Cooperative matrix example.

Matrix Multiplication

Matrix multiplication example.

Subgroup operations

Shader subgroup operations.

Structure references

This test showcases GLSL structure mapping to raw SSBO buffer, enabling storage of data with different layouts within a single SSBO buffer.

Shader Printf

A simple preprocessor-based printf() functionality for compute shaders that work with all APIs.

Interface

Interface Canvas

Different CanvasElement classes, including texture filtration, gradients, contour outlines, and SVG rendering.

Interface Controls

Different User Interface Control classes in resolution-independent configuration.

SVG

This plugin enables SVG images support for Control widgets.
docs.tellusim.com/core/plugins/interface/svg

Flow

Flow Control is a universal node-based editor designed for a variety of applications, including material and logic editing. It includes base implementations in both GLSL and C++.
docs.tellusim.com/core/plugins/interface/flow

Color

Color selector control.
docs.tellusim.com/core/plugins/interface/color

Interface Element

A CanvasElement wrapper that allows elements to be rendered and manipulated inside a Controls widgets.
docs.tellusim.com/core/plugins/interface/element

Button

A generic button controller that uses custom Canvas elements as Control button.
docs.tellusim.com/core/plugins/interface/button

Slider

A generic slider controller that uses custom Canvas elements as Control slider.
docs.tellusim.com/core/plugins/interface/slider

Plotter

A simple line plotter visualization plugin.
docs.tellusim.com/core/plugins/interface/plotter

A generic tooltip Control allows the display of help information over other interface controls.
docs.tellusim.com/core/plugins/interface/tooltip

This plugin provides support for dynamic popup windows and contextual menus within the interface.

Interface Layer

A transparent multilayer Controls with variable background blur.

Manipulator Plugin

Manipulator is a simple translator and rotator control for the scene editor.
docs.tellusim.com/core/plugins/interface/manipulator

App

This plugin provides a framework for single-window Control-based applications.
docs.tellusim.com/core/plugins/interface/app

Shape

This example renders cubic shape with applied Stroke and Gradient styles.

SVG Image

Simple SVG image loading and rendering. CanvasShape class accepts SVG path string as input data.

Custom Control

Custom Controls can be created by simple ControlBase class inheritance. The Control behavior can be completely overridden.

Parallel

Parallel TensorGraph from PyTorch

Simple convolutional autoencoder trained with PyTorch and imported into TensorGraph.

Parallel TensorGraph MNIST Digits Recognition

MNIST Digits Recognition using TensorGraph with PyTorch model.

Parallel Fourier 2D

Image convolution based on Fast Fourier Transformation.

Parallel Fluid 2D

Simple 2D fluid simulation based on Fast Fourier Transformation.

Parallel Radix Sort

Multiple independent sorting algorithms can be dispatched in parallel. There is no overhead in comparision with the single array sort. Additionally, dispatch parameters can be fetched from the indirect buffer.
'1' shows the input data.
'2' activates global sort.

Parallel Spatial Grid

Simple physics simulation with collisions based on the SpatialGrid class. It is the fastest way to collide objects of the same size.

Parallel Spatial Tree

Simple physics simulation with collisions based on the SpatialTree class. The SpatialTree allows collision and intersection tests with any primitive inside BVH.

Geometry

Mesh Reduce

MeshReduce is a simple way to simplify input mesh geometry. Simplification preserves all Mesh Attributes, and it is compatible with Skinning Animation.
'1' shows the original geometry.

Mesh Refine

MeshRefine refines geometry mesh using Catmull-Clark (for quadrilaterals) or Loop (for triangles) subdivision algorithms. The Crease Attribute allows additional control over the subdivision process.
'1' shows the original geometry.

Plugins

Open Neural Network Exchange

The ONNX plugin allows loading and running ONNX models with TensorGraph on all platforms and APIs.
docs.tellusim.com/core/plugins/parallel/onnx

OpenXR

OpenXR VR/AR plugin. Supports Vulkan, Direct3D12, Direct3D11, OpenGL APIs on PC; Vulkan, OpenGLES on Android. This plugin creates an OpenXR-compatible output window with any number of channels. The input layer provides a simplified API for the OpenXR input system.
docs.tellusim.com/core/plugins/platform/openxr