Re: [boost] GIL Graphics Examples

From: Joel de Guzman (joel_at_[hidden])
Date: 2007-10-17 19:07:33

Tom Brinkman wrote:
>>> A nice idea is to fork AntiGrain 2.4 into something Boost-like
>>> and integrate it with GIL. If I had time to spare, this is what
>>> I would do.
> 
> Having worked with GIL now for over a year, I can honestly say that it is a
> real break through for graphics developers.  The concept of a submimage_view
> is very
> supportive of creating generic functional components, similar in a way to
> your spirit library.  GIL is a superb base upon which to build
> a graphics library.
> 
> Working with experts in functional programming like yourself,
> using GIL as a base, developing a graphics library for simple primitves,
> such
> as lines, circles and polygons would be a trivial matter,
> and its already basically finished.
> 
> Anti-grain is a half-finished library which works well in areas.  However,
> I'm persuaded that GIL is the library upon which I think will
> ultmiately prevail.  With adobe supporting the GIL library, who support
> functional programmers with many of their open-source offerings,
> it seems like a much better bet to go with adobe.  I've moved my application
> to GIL and have not looked back.
> 
> I encourage you and any other graphics programmers to give it a strong look.
> If I can persuade you to look harder at GIL, I would love to pick your brain
> about how to make a graphics library that works as well as your spirit
> library.

I did work on GIL. I did a very rough port of AntiGrain 2.4 to
GIL when it was being reviewed. Here it is, in case you've missed
it: http://spirit.sourceforge.net/dl_more/gil/gil.zip and the
nice Lions rendered using AntiGrain with GIL backend:
http://spirit.sourceforge.net/dl_more/gil/lion.png

IMO, Antigrain is a half-finished only in the sense that it
severely lacks documentation. I don't know what more functionality
you need that's not there already. At any rate, it would take lots
of years to get something even remotely close to what Antigrain
offers. In what areas do you think Antigrain lacks? Can't we
deal with that instead of rewriting from scratch?

What's really discouraging is that Antigrain switched to GPL! Argh!
A lot of people have been affected by that move from Antigrain 2.5.
Some folks in the Antigrain community have been discussing a fork
from 2.4.

Regards,
-- 
Joel de Guzman
http://www.boost-consulting.com
http://spirit.sf.net