Re: Reduced Image Quality for 32x32 Pixel Units

[Eric McDonald <mcdonald at phy dot cmich dot edu>]

mskala@ansuz.sooke.bc.ca wrote:

> Another possible way of dealing with it might be to change the APIs so
> that the interface can request from the kernel "Give me an image somewhere
> in this range of sizes, and try to avoid scaling if possible."  

This is what I was looking into earlier today in response to Elijah's 
bug report. It seems that 'best_image' could be modified to take "int 
w1, int h1, int w2, int h2" instead of "int w, int h". Probably we would 
want to change its name to 'best_image_in_range' or something like that. 
For backwards compatibility, we then make a 'best_image' function which 
calls 'best_image_in_range' with w1 == w2 and h1 == h2. I started to 
look at the logic involved, but got distracted by other things. I could 
probably make the changes, but I would be much more comfortable if you 
did, Matthew.

> I'm starting to get a rough idea of what API changes need to be made.
> Maybe it'd be appropriate to do the CVS-branch thing, 

I'll try to get around to setting up a branch in CVS tomorrow. As long 
as the yellow pixels problem and low res pixel color problems are fixed 
before 7.5.0, I don't really care how long development goes on in a 
special branch.

> FWIW, I actually like the blocky look of the scaled images, but I'm
> guessing I'm in the minority there.

I have mixed feelings about it. But, I have an old monitor with a 
not-so-good dot pitch, so the way I see things on screen is generally 
not as clearly as people using sharper monitors.

Eric