Hi, The mail from Alex is a bit cryptic. Alex, please send a more elaborate answer :).
Cheers, Doru > On Jan 26, 2017, at 9:10 PM, Aliaksei Syrel <[email protected]> wrote: > > Hi, > > Then we will need Cairo + SDL2 (that does not work for us) + Freetype2 (for > fonts) + Graphite (glyphs shaping technology in order to use them within > vector graphics engine) + cross platform OpenGL / Vulkan context/device > provider for hardware acceleration + implement Filters for effects (blur, > lights, color matrix filters, etc...). > > Without all those technologies bloc WILL progress, from 80's to 00's. Still > decades behind :) > > Cheers > > On Jan 26, 2017 20:40, "stepharong" <[email protected]> wrote: > I think that instead of investigating gtk (yet another library to bind and > carry around), > it would be smarter to have Sparta back-end using an accelerated Cairo + > pango. > Why? Because > - For example Cairo will not disappear in the future (here you will > tell me that it does not have all the full > features.... I think that Bloc should deliver Brick first and focus > on this because else it will stay a nice > experiment.) > - We do not have bench with an accelerated compiled version so no > idea if this is good enough. > - Cairo is about 1.5 mb vs 20Mb and it is packaged. > > I share the concerns of Esteban about the maintenance of such Mozz2d bundling > and he was pretty > clear with me, he will not maintain it nor take any responsibility about > pharo using it. > > So having a Cairo Sparta back-end would be a smart move. > Stef > > > > > > Hi, > > Thank you for the intensive set of issues you raised during the Bloc > presentation. I think it is worthwhile addressing them more thoroughly, so > let me start with the issue that seemed to have caused the most worries: > Sparta & Moz2D. > > Please keep in mind that while I am involved to some extent in Bloc, the real > credits for the current state go to Glenn and Alex. > > Moz2D (https://github.com/mozilla/moz2d, > https://wiki.mozilla.org/Platform/GFX/Moz2D) offers an advanced backend and > using it puts us on par with the rendering speed of a web browser, which is a > significant added value over what we have now. > > However, as it was noted, it does come with a cost due to the fact that it is > not available as standalone with only the features we are interested in. The > vector graphics part is actually buildable out of the box. However, the text > support needs to be extracted out of Moz2D, and this is where the patching > scripts are used. The patches are there only for compilation purposes and not > for features and they are applied automatically. You can see it here: > https://github.com/syrel/Moz2D > > Alex updated recently the Moz2D version and it worked without problems. Of > course, future changes in Moz2D might imply changes in this script as well, > and this implies that we will need to maintain that script. And we could > imagine applying these patches on the trunk of Moz2D to see if they work, and > we can also imagine engaging with the Moz2D owners to see if we can find a > middle ground. > > Now, let’s put this into perspective. We are currently using Athens and the > Cairo backend. While Cairo is provided as a standalone library it has not > seen significant advances since Mozzila shifted its focus towards Moz2D. So, > sticking with it might not be an ideal strategy either. > > Furthermore, just like Athens, Sparta is an abstraction that allows us to > switch the underlying backend should we need to. Until now we did not find a > cross-platform backend that is as advanced and complete as Moz2D, but there > is no reason to think that none other will appear in the future. Skia is an > alternative but it is only a vector graphic engine without text support, so > using it would imply to have another library for the text support. > > Sparta also comes with a reasonable set of tests that is aimed at testing the > basic Moz2D functionality to make sure that the assumptions on top of which > Sparta is built are correct. > > All in all, I think that the current situation is not ideal, but there is > already enough engineering in place to actually make it work. And I > definitely think that the potential it opens is rather significant. > > And, if more people look at the scripts, we might find even better and > cheaper ways to express it. > > Cheers, > Doru > > > -- > www.tudorgirba.com > www.feenk.com > > "We cannot reach the flow of things unless we let go." > > > > > > > > -- > Using Opera's mail client: http://www.opera.com/mail/ > -- www.tudorgirba.com www.feenk.com "Every thing has its own flow."
