+++ Martin Sluka [04-03-06 09:48 +0100]: >> At 12:42 +0000 3.3.2004, Wookey wrote: >> ******************************************* >> > >>> >OK, but I don't own _any_ machines with that _much_ ram (and I've got 5, >>> >excluding ARM machines and PDAs)! The only one I have access to with >256 >>> >Mb of RAM is the server here and that already jammed up against it's >>> >memory limits doing other things anyway. > >> >> TCL and RGB - TCL must calculate each pixel as RGB, mostly all >> monitors are RGB, BW monitors are exception. TCL must send RGB data >> to video.
That's irrelevant - it's not TCL that sends the signals directly to the monitor - that's framebuffer/video drivers/X/video hardware. When working with B&W TCL could perfectly well use 1 byte or even 1bit image representations. I realise that it doesn't, but it still doesn't need to zoom all the image which is off-screen. Smart image manipulation software works in tiles to keep memory requirements sensible. >> Wookey, I apologize myself, I know, I do quite different things on my >> comps (DTP, picture manipulations in Photoshop and so on.), but one >> of the best time saving investment in my life was to buy 1 GB (or >> more) RAM for each comp I use. >> >> We live in time when one may compare price of one RAM chip to price >> of beers drinked in one night ;))) . I remember many many times more >> expensive ones. That's only true if the hardware you have has the capacity for lots of RAM. My laptop can only have a max of 256 fitted, my desktop 512 the servers here 256 and 512 respectively. If you have to buy new motherboards (which means new cases - AT->ATX) new IO cards (ISA/VLBUS->PCI) and so on, then it is not simply the matter of the memory cost. I realise new hardware is relatively cheap these days but in this case (displaying a scanned image at arbitrary resolution) I don't believe the correct answer to crappy memory management in the underlying language is 'go and buy a new computer'. When you can't zoom a 4MB image to 200% on a 64MB computer with a virual memory system then the software is deeply inefficient and that should be addressed, not simply accepted. That way leads to massive software bloat. I can zoom the very same image several thousand pecent on the same machine using the GIMP, showing that it is perfectly feasible (which is obvious anyway of course). I understand that Stacho has better things to do right now than worry about TCL's crummy image-handling, but I can't accept the 'just buy a new computer' argument - we should have higher intellectual standards than that, and more to the point I don't have the money to splash around on new computers - I just bought one to play DVDs, so that's my budget for the couple of years spent... Wookey -- Aleph One Ltd, Bottisham, CAMBRIDGE, CB5 9BA, UK Tel +44 (0) 1223 811679 work: http://www.aleph1.co.uk/ play: http://www.chaos.org.uk/~wookey/
