AMD said it is awaiting certification from Khronos, the industry body that was founded in 2000 to promote standard for graphics and media. The submission puts AMD closer to being the only semiconductor provider to offer both GPU and central processing unit (CPU) development environments for OpenCL, AMD claimed.

OpenCL, or Open Computing Language, is a framework for writing programs that execute across heterogeneous platforms consisting of CPUs, GPUs, and other processors. OpenCL includes a language based on C99 for writing kernels and APIs to define access to other software. It is one of the candidate mechanisms to enable parallel processing on multicore processor ICs.

AMD said that its ATI Stream technology leverages OpenCL to help developers divide software workloads between the CPU and GPU for more efficient execution. AMD delivered a beta release of an OpenCL software development platform for x86-based CPUs on Aug. 5, 2009, which was certified conformant by Khronos on Sept. 3, 2009.

The ATI Stream SDK v2.0 for CPU and GPU software development using OpenCL is planned for release later this year, AMD said.

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