Patent ID: 8614709

Claim:
A method for generating scalable graphics for a graphical user interface, the method comprising: receiving a first effect to apply to an element in a graphical user interface; receiving a second effect to apply to the element in the graphical user interface; ordering the first effect and the second effect into a pipeline of operations; and defining a markup language effect template that includes the pipeline of operations in a markup language and links to an effect resource, the effect resource being linked to a plurality of different markup language effect templates; determining graphics hardware capabilities of a first graphics processing unit; determining graphics hardware capabilities of a second graphics processing unit different than the first graphics processing unit; after determining graphics hardware capabilities of the first graphics processing unit, creating from the markup language effect template with the effect resource a first shader in accordance with the graphics hardware capabilities of the first graphics processing unit, the first shader to adjust an element in a graphical user interface for the first graphics processing unit; after determining graphics hardware capabilities of the second graphics processing unit, creating from the markup language effect template with the effect resource a second shader in accordance with the graphics hardware capabilities of the second graphics processing unit, the second shader to adjust an element in a graphical user interface of the second graphics processing unit, wherein the second shader is configured to implement one or more effects that are supported by the second graphics processing unit but not by the first graphics processing unit, and wherein the first shader is not configured to implement the one or more effects.