Re: GNUstep Window Manager (was RE: Idea)

[Philippe C . D . Robert]

Jason H Clouse <jhclouse@juno.com> wrote (Sun, 7 Jan 2001 18:31:30 -0500):
> <<GDK together with libart could IMHO provide all the missing
> functionality (ps!) in conjunction with performance *and* more developers
> (the GDK/libart maintainers, since we would just use those libs as
> backend).>>
> 
> Could you give more information (I'm not familiar with them).  Would this
> sacrifice the NeXT look'n'feel?  Would it be optional?

GDK is a lowlevel windowing lib while libart provides PS like, fast rendering 
capabilities:

Libart is a high-performance rendering library that provides a rich imaging 
model. Libart's imaging model is
a superset of PostScript, and it adds support for antialiasing and alpha 
compositing (transparency). 
Libart is used as the core rendering engine for both the GNOME canvas and the 
GNOME printing system.
It uses sophisticated techniques such as microtile arrays and sorted vector 
paths to maximize performance. 
Libart provides a wealth of vector path-manipulation operations, affine 
transformations, antialiased and
alpha-composited vector path rendering, and functions for manipulating Bézier 
paths. 

I don't know libart in great detail, but it looks promising. It could perhaps 
be used to implement sth like CoreGraphics for GNUstep.

> Doh!  I didn't consider that!  Perhaps Java?  I see the Objective C thing
> as being a real roadblock to getting developers on.  Even though it isn't
> difficult to learn (from my personal experience, at least) people seem
> much more likely to get involved with a project in a language they know.

There is already a working Java bridge for GNUstep!
 
cheers, Phil
--
Philippe C.D. Robert | http://www.nice.ch/~phip/