Effects for Direct3D 11 Update
codeplex, direct3d, dxsdkOriginally posted to Chuck Walbourn's Blog on MSDN,
The Effects 11 library (FX11) was made available as shared-source in the DirectX SDK. Previous versions of the Effects library were part of D3DX (FX9) or built into the OS (FX10). With the DirectX SDK now legacy (see Where is the DirectX SDK?), there are still a number of people looking for the latest version since it is not included in the Windows 8.0 SDK. This post provides an updated version of the Effects 11 (FX11) library. The primary purpose of this release is to remove the dependencies on the legacy DirectX SDK for the D3DX11 headers, but it also includes some code tidying and a few customer requests.
The project on GitHub is marked as archive. It is still available for use for legacy projects, but use of it for new projects is not recommended.
If you still need Visual Studio 2008 support, you should keep using the legacy DirectX SDK (June 2010) version.
Disclaimer
Effects 11 is primarily being provided as a porting aid for older code that make use of the Effects 10 (FX10) API or Effects 9 (FX9) API in the deprecated D3DX9 library. See Microsoft Docs for a list of differences compared to the Effects 10 (FX10) library.
- The Effects 11 library is for use in Win32 desktop applications. FX11 requires the D3DCompiler API be available at runtime to provide shader reflection functionality, and this API is not deployable for Windows Store apps on Windows 8 or Windows RT.
- The
fx_5_0profile support in the HLSL compiler is deprecated, and does not fully support DirectX 11.1 HLSL features such as minimum precision types. It is supported in the Windows 8.0 SDK version of the HLSL compiler (FXC.EXE) and D3DCompile API (#46), but could be removed in a future update. - The Visual Studio 2012 graphics diagnostics feature has had some problems when trying to debug
fx_5_0profile shaders. You may want to try the latest VS 2012 Update.
The new
DXC.EXEDXIL compiler does not support thefxprofile or it’s constructs. See GitHub
Porting Notes
Here’s a handy table of equivalents related to Effects (see Living without D3DX for a complete listing):
D3DXCreateEffect
D3DXCreateEffectEx
D3DXCreateEffectFromResource
D3DXCreateEffectFromResourceEx
D3D10CompileEffectFromMemory |
D3DX11CompileEffectFromMemory |
D3DXCreateEffectFromFile
D3DXCreateEffectFromFileEx |
D3DX11CompileEffectFromFile |
D3D10CreateEffectFromMemory |
D3DX11CreateEffectFromMemory |
D3DXCreateEffectPool
D3D10CreateEffectPoolFromMemory |
Effects 11 does not support 'effect pools'
or D3DCOMPILE_EFFECT_CHILD_EFFECT. Effect groups provide a more efficient solution for common scenarios previously addressed with 'effect pools' |
D3DXDisassembleEffect
D3D10DisassembleEffect |
D3DDisassemble
D3DDisassemble10Effect in D3DCompile |
Version History
See GitHub for the complete version history.
Update: Effects 11 is now hosted on CodePlex and GitHub. The latest version of the library, documentation, release history, and other information is now available there.
Samples: Effects 11 Win32 Samples on GitHub: Direct3D11TutorialsFX11, BasicHLSLFX11, DynamicShaderLinkageFX11, FixedFuncEmuFX11, and InstancingFX11.
vcpkg: The vcpkg C++ Package Manager has an effects11 port available.
NuGet: This NuGet contains the last release of Effects.
Related: DirectXTex and Effects 11 Update