November 2010 - Boost - lists.boost.org

Formal Review of IO and Toolbox extensions to Boost.GIL starts TOMORROW
by Mateusz Loskot 12 Dec '10

12 Dec '10

Dear All, According to the Boost Formal Review Schedule [1], review of Christian Henning's extensions to the Boost Generic Image Library (Boost.GIL, [2]), it is: * Boost.GIL.IO * Boost.GIL.Toolbox starts on December 1st and lasts until December 10th, 2010. [1] http://www.boost.org/community/review_schedule.html [2] http://www.boost.org/doc/libs/release/libs/gil/doc/index.html =========== What is it? =========== The Boost.GIL.IO extension provides an easy to use interface for reading and writing various image formats. It also includes a framework for adding new formats. The Boost.GIL.IO is indent to replace the current IO extension which is part of Boost for several years now. Features: * A unified way to read and write image encoded in BMP, JPEG, PNG, PNM, and TIFF formats. The capabilities to read and write in various formats have improved dramatically. * Image data can be provided via standard file or string streams The Boost.GIL.Toolbox provides new color spaces and other small code to ease programming with Boost.GIL. Features: * Implementation of color spaces: Gray_Alpha, HSL, HSV, LAB, and XYZ * Utilities to support dynamic image workflows and color conversions. * Collection of metafunctions to determine alignment, similarity and homogeneity at pixel level. The Boost.GIL as well as the proposed extensions are provided in form of a headers-only library Although, some image formats come with their format dependency, it is corresponding third-party libraries: JPEG - libjpeg PNG - libpng TIFF - libtiff =================== Getting the library =================== The latest version of both extensions can be downloaded as Zip package: http://gil-contributions.googlecode.com/files/boost_review.zip or directly from the Subversion repository: http://code.google.com/p/gil-contributions/source/browse/trunk/gil_2/ and the docs can built as usual with bjam and quickbook tools from within libs/gil/io_new/doc directory The libs/gil/io_new/test/readme.txt provides a step by step guide to configuring, building and running the unit tests. The boost_review.zip is about 20MB due to its extensive collection of test images. They are part of the test suite to make sure that different variations of each image format is read and written correctly. Please, be aware no guarantee can be given that all formats in their all variants are completely supported. ================ Writing a review ================ If you feel the new IO and Toolbox are interesting extensions to the Boost.GIL library, then please submit your review to the developer list (preferably), or to the review manager (mateusz at loskot dot _n_e_t_) Here are some questions you might want to answer in your review: - What is your evaluation of the design? - What is your evaluation of the implementation? - What is your evaluation of the documentation? - What is your evaluation of the potential usefulness of the extensions? - Did you try to use the extensions? With what compiler? Did you have any problems? - How much effort did you put into your evaluation? A glance? A quick - reading? In-depth study? - Are you knowledgeable about the problem domain? And finally, every review should answer this question: - Do you think the extensions should be accepted as a part of Boost.GIL library? Be sure to say this explicitly so that your other comments don't obscure your overall opinion. Mateusz Review Manager for the proposed Boost.GIL.IO and Boost.GIL.Toolbox extensions -- Mateusz Loskot, http://mateusz.loskot.net Charter Member of OSGeo, http://osgeo.org Member of ACCU, http://accu.org

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[serialization] boost 1.45. I did not find any information about serios flaw in 1.44
by Sergey Voropaev 09 Dec '10

09 Dec '10

I am reporter of bug #4660 (https://svn.boost.org/trac/boost/ticket/4660) I am glad this bug was fixed in 1.45 version. But I did not find any information in release notes (http://www.boost.org/users/download/version_1_45_0) and in library documentation (http://www.boost.org/doc/libs/1_45_0/libs/serialization/doc/index.html) about what was fixed in 1.44 version. There are not any recommendations or comments about using version 1.44 with binary archives. I think that the absence of such information is very dangerous for the future of the serialization library, since this is a serious indicator of the quality of maintenance of the library. (I have no complaints about the quality of the library and its design) Should I reopen this bug, or open a new one, or this letter would be sufficient to restore order to the documentation of serialization library?

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Library for configuration file parsing
by Denis Shevchenko 04 Dec '10

04 Dec '10

Hi all! Is there any interest in a library for configuration file parsing? I know there is a good library Program_options, but it supports (asit is written in the documentation) "parsing of simple INI-like configuration files". If all you need for configure your programs is INI-like files - use Program_options and forget about this letter. But if you want to use a more complex configuration files, you may be interested in my library, Configurator. simplest.conf: Host = 127.0.0.1 Code for work with this config: cf::configurator configurator; configurator.add_option( "Host" ); configurator.parse( "/some/path/to/simplest.conf" ); std::cout << "Value of host: " << configurator.get_value( "Host" )<< std::endl; Features - Header-only - Allows to set option's default value or/and necessity. - Allows to use arbitrary nesting of sections. - Provides "standard" checks of value's semantic, like correct path, IP validity, email correctness, etc. - Provides "extended" checks of value's semantic, like time period and file size. - Provides common checks of options and sections, like duplication, incorrection, etc. - Supports single-line and multi-line comments (in C++ style). - Allow to register values with multi-values. - Allows to set another "name-value" separator (including space symbol), instead default '='.

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Probing interest in a typed XML traversal library
by Sumant Tambe 02 Dec '10

02 Dec '10

Hello boosters! I'm interested in gauging interest in a typed XML traversal library that combines the succinctness of XPath with the type-safety of XML data-binding tools. I've been developing one such library called LEESA: Language for Embedded Query and Traversal <http://www.dre.vanderbilt.edu/LEESA>. LEESA has several capabilities: 1. Succinct and expressive XPath-like notation for writing object structure traversals 2. Supports child, parent, sibling, descendant, ancestor axes 3. Compile-time schema conformance checking 4. Supports GOF visitors and hierarchical visitors 5. Strategic Programming ... and more! Here are two quick examples comparing XPath and LEESA. More examples are available on the LEESA homepage. XPath expression: "/catalog/book/author/name/text()" LEESA expression: *std::vector<name> author_names = evaluate(root, catalog() >> book() >> author() >> name()); * XPath expression: "//name/text()" LEESA Expression: *std::vector<name> names = evaluate(root, catalog() >> DescendantsOf(catalog(), name())); * The above expressions are checked for schema-conformance at compile-time. LEESA builds these capabilities on top of existing XML data binding tools that generate C++ code from .xsd files. The general process of using LEESA is as follows: 1. Generate C++ classes using your favorite XML data binding tool 2. A python script that comes with LEESA adds a few functions in every generated C++ class. It generates a lot of typedefs and helper functions, which invoke tool generated code. This creates a bridge between LEESA and the code generated by the xml data binding tool. Currently it supports Code Synthesis's xsd and Universal Data Model (UDM) from Vanderbilt University as the underlying code generators. 3. The user includes LEESA.h in his/her C++ program (it is header-only), uses its programming model, compiles, and links with the tool generated code and libraries. So folks, please speak up if you are interested in having such a library in Boost. Thanks, Sumant

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[Bug Sprint] The November bug sprint starts tomorrow!
by Marshall Clow 02 Dec '10

02 Dec '10

The Boost bug sprint starts tomorrow Saturday, November 27, 2010 and runs through Sunday December 5th. The goal of the bug sprint is to make Boost better; the way we measure this is to look at the open tickets in the Trac system. In the last bug sprint (back in June), we closed over 200 tickets. However, in the past five months, the number of open tickets has crept back up, so that we once again have more than 900 open tickets. (the count was down under 800 at the end of the previous sprint). General information about the bug sprint is here: https://svn.boost.org/trac/boost/wiki/BugSprintNov2010 General information about how the Trac system works is here: https://svn.boost.org/trac/boost/wiki/TicketWorkflow Useful reports: https://svn.boost.org/trac/boost/report/1 -- full list of tickets https://svn.boost.org/trac/boost/report/18 -- ticket counts by owner https://svn.boost.org/trac/boost/report/19 -- ticket counts by component https://svn.boost.org/trac/boost/report/20 -- ticket counts by ticket type https://svn.boost.org/trac/boost/report/21 -- ticket counts by milestone -- Marshall

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Getting volunteers' changes back to trunk
by Jim Bell 01 Dec '10

01 Dec '10

Say you have a team of volunteers attacking failed regressions and tickets. They're creating (hopefully) good trunk patches. They can't commit to the trunk, but can modify tickets. If maintainers are active, they could review and incorporate them. But this increased activity may be more of a strain for them. If maintainers are MIA, it won't happen. So we need at least one person to bring these changes back into the trunk. Changes to libraries they're not familiar with. What's the best way for the volunteers to signal to these trunk-authority people to pick up their change? A Ticket keyword and corresponding report should work. Is there a better way? Should we look for a person or two from the volunteers for this role? A regular schedule (say, twice a week) to run the report and patch would be good, I think. Trunk regressions need time to bake. Thoughts?

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Is merging to the release branch allowed again?
by Hartmut Kaiser 01 Dec '10

01 Dec '10

Since I hate holding back merging to the release branch to the last minute before the next release I would like to start doing this asap. Any idea when this might be allowed again? Regards Hartmut --------------- http://boost-spirit.com

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[mpl-cf] [RFC] MPL Real Numbers using Continued Fractions
by Hal Finkel 01 Dec '10

01 Dec '10

Hello, A few months ago, I created an MPL extension type for representing real numbers. The indented use is for compile-time generation of floating-point constants, although it could also be used for MPL-based graph algorithms, etc. The primary design requirement was that almost any compiler would be able to completely inline the conversion to floating-point (which means no functional recursion can be used), and I think I've achieved that. The current implementation uses a modified version of MPL's vector type (modified to add the conversion to floating point, add "overloads", and to remove the typeof-based implementation variant (which is incompatible with the floating-point conversion)). I've posted the code to the Boost vault under the "Template Metaprogramming" section; the file name is boost-mpl-cf-20100531.zip Continued fractions were chosen for the representation because the associated algorithms are simple, and simple proved important for keeping down compilation times. Even so, the compilation times might be too long for practical use. You can decrease the compilation time by using a shorter maximum cf-length by defining BOOST_MPL_LIMIT_CF_SIZE to be 10 instead of 20. The current default is 20 to allow an effective precision near that of a double. Also, continued fractions, being "based on" rational numbers, can exactly represent any rational (for example, 1/3) so the computations can be more accurate than those using a floating-point representation. If you don't know what a continued fraction is, and would like to know, you can check out the wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continued_fraction The current implementation supports addition, subtraction, multiplication and division, comparison ops, some constants like pi, and I've included sin()/cos() as well. I've not yet written any real documentation, but the archive has a couple of test programs; the usage is pretty simple. Each test program has many individual tests, so its compilation time will be representative of a more-complicated computation, if you just need to do a few things, it would be much faster. If there is interest, I'll add support for generating numbers using metafunctions, write some documentation, jam files, etc. Let me know what you think, and I welcome suggestions, criticisms, etc. Also, I've currently tested using only the GNU and Intel compilers, so let me know whether it does or does not work when using something else. Thanks again, Hal P.S. I know that there is a mpl_math archive on the vault from back in 2007. I did not discover this until after I had almost finished writing my mpl-cf implementation, but, the mailing-list messages from the time indicate that it was too slow to be used practically, since I think the continued fractions algorithms are simpler, mpl-cf might be better, but I've not tested it to find out.

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Re: [boost] Boost 1.45 compile error
by Eric Niebler 01 Dec '10

01 Dec '10

(bringing in boost dev...) This sounds bad. Can anybody confirm? -- Eric Niebler BoostPro Computing http://www.boostpro.com On 11/19/2010 4:35 PM, gast128 wrote: > Hello all, > > just tried out Boost 1.45 on VStudio 2003 but I got a compile error by only > including type_traits: > > #include <boost/type_traits.hpp> > > int main() > { > return 0; > } > > C:\Work Sdk\boost_1_45_0\boost\typeof\msvc\typeof_impl.hpp(160) : error C2027: > use of undefined type '<Unknown>' > C:\Work Sdk\boost_1_45_0\boost\typeof\msvc\typeof_impl.hpp(143) : see > declaration of '<Unknown>' > C:\Work Sdk\boost_1_45_0\boost\typeof\msvc\typeof_impl.hpp(160) : see > reference to class template instantiation '<Unknown>' being compiled > C:\Work Sdk\boost_1_45_0\boost\type_traits\common_type.hpp(121) : see > reference to class template instantiation '<Unknown>' being compiled > C:\Work Sdk\boost_1_45_0\boost\type_traits\common_type.hpp(123) : see > reference to class template > instantiation 'boost::type_traits_detail::common_type_2<T,U>' being compiled > C:\Work Sdk\boost_1_45_0\boost\typeof\msvc\typeof_impl.hpp(160) : error C2146: > syntax error : missing ';' before identifier 'wrapped_type' > C:\Work Sdk\boost_1_45_0\boost\typeof\msvc\typeof_impl.hpp(160) : error > C2501: '<Unknown>' : missing storage-class or type specifiers > C:\Work Sdk\boost_1_45_0\boost\typeof\msvc\typeof_impl.hpp(161) : error > C2653: 'wrapped_type' : is not a class or namespace name > > afaik it seems located on 121 in 'boost/type_traits/coomon_type.hpp' > > Anyone can help?

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[gil] New IO release
by Christian Henning 01 Dec '10

01 Dec '10

Hi there, a new gil IO extension is ready for download. Here is the link: http://code.google.com/p/gil-contributions/downloads/detail?name=boost_revi… This is the final version that will be used for the boost review. Could someone try to build documentation on Linux? Thanks to all people that have helped me out. Regards, Christian

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