Re: Re: gtk2?

On Sun, 2002-01-13 at 13:00, Alan Cox wrote:
> > Don't forget we get to ditch gdk_imlib! I don't like having to jump
> > through hoops with it. (Ok, two lines to load an image isn't terrible,
> > but gtk_image_new_from_file("x.png") is *so* much nicer :)
>
> Thats not entirely a good thing right now. On my 486 class boxes gdk_imlib
> is much much faster than gdk_pixbuf (20second versus 15 minute startup for
> xfce). I just hope the ARM one has the right ARM specific optimisations
Fifteen *minutes*!?
Ok, 486, but *fifteen minutes*? There is something seriously wrong
there, surely?
Either way, neither library is likely to see lots of use unless a pixmap
theme were running - in which case the user is probably insane anyway :)

I just perused gdk-pixbuf (from gtk+-1.3.11) and couldn't see evidence
of more than [x86 MMX] optimisations; not being into the lower-level
stuff (usually) I could have easily overlooked ARM-specific
optimisations. Maybe someone who has it build could compare load times?
ATM we waste far more CPU cycles in python anyway :) I love the language
but on a 200MHz processor it can be really slow...

And besides, there's nothing to stop ARM coders writing optimisations
for gdk-pixbuf. (*hint*, *hint* :-)

IIRC, gdk-pixbuf also supports things like alpha-channel properly (ie.
>1 bit), which would be nice (though not necessary). On my desktop,
gdk-pixbuf from gtk+2 is ~136kb[0], libimlib is 144k. (Both .so, BTW).
The file loaders are about the same size[1], but gdk-pixbuf has quite a
few more loaders. (Which is probably irrelevant; we'd probably ditch
most of the rarer ones)

> > Did you need ATK? Or is it safe to ditch at compile-time? IMO it would
>
> ATK may well be useful. ATK already handles things like screen magnification
> and screen reading, which on a PDA might help us all
... so it would be good as an option, but probably not necessary for 95%
of people IMVHO.

[0] libgdk-pixbuf + libgdk-pixbuf-xlib
[1] 8-24kb; the gdk-pixbuf ones are on the heaver side though

mibus
(*fifteen minutes*!? StarOffice loads faster :)

-- 
Robert Mibus <mibus_at_bigpond.com>