freetype bytecode interpreter
 

It may yet be too early to get a definite answer about this, but I'm
wondering what the status of the formerly patented bytecode interpreter
in freetype will be in RHEL/Centos 6 and possibly future updates to
RHEL/Centos 5.

The patent on the technology has apparently now expired.
http://freetype.sourceforge.net/patents.html and
http://apple.slashdot.org/story/10/07/19/1524250/FreeType-Project-Cheers-TrueType-Patent-Expiration

Effective with freetype 2.4 the technology will enabled by default at
the freetype website. I just checked and the version in the RHEL 6 beta
appears to be 2.3.11


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freetype bytecode interpreter
 

On Mon, 19 Jul 2010, Frank Cox wrote:

> It may yet be too early to get a definite answer about this, but I'm
> wondering what the status of the formerly patented bytecode interpreter
> in freetype will be in RHEL/Centos 6 and possibly future updates to
> RHEL/Centos 5.

CentOS just rebuilds sources to conform to certain goals --
the 'upgrades / freshenings' request department is on a list
run by the upstream

https://www.redhat.com/archives/rhelv6-beta-list

That said, I saw speculation picked up in a aggregator run by
Infoworld <?> that the RHEL 6 stabilization was going slower
than expected and that a gold by EOY was a new target date.

While this may induce a reluctance to change matters too
much, a closer to the 'leaf node' package such as freetype may
be 'doable' if you ask, and as I recall, RFE it in their
Bugzilla; requests with working caldidates agains their public
beta may also change how such a request is viewed [based upon
my years of 'kremlinology' as to Raleigh]

-- Russ herrold
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freetype bytecode interpreter
 

On Tue, 2010-07-20 at 06:24 -0400, R P Herrold wrote:
> While this may induce a reluctance to change matters too
> much, a closer to the 'leaf node' package such as freetype may
> be 'doable' if you ask, and as I recall, RFE it in their
> Bugzilla;

Upon checking the redhat bugzilla, I found that this issue has already
been posted under the Fedora category:

https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=612395

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freetype bytecode interpreter
 

On Tue, 20 Jul 2010, Frank Cox wrote:

> On Tue, 2010-07-20 at 06:24 -0400, R P Herrold wrote:
>> While this may induce a reluctance to change matters too
>> much, a closer to the 'leaf node' package such as freetype may
>> be 'doable' if you ask, and as I recall, RFE it in their
>> Bugzilla;

> Upon checking the redhat bugzilla, I found that this issue has already
> been posted under the Fedora category:
>
> https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=612395

Reading that and the companion mentioned in the last comment,
my takeaway is that fonts in fedora are (or were) bad [I trust
m miller's judgment here, and have for a long time, as he is
a thoughtful analyst], and that there is not much urgency
in making the issue better. As I don't have the strength to
follow that churn and the traffic in various venue that fedora
folk use, I conclude without knowing of some un-Bugzillaed
side discussion: it's not ready yet

Additionally, I see mention of ghostscript, and don't they
have (or had) something like a no FOSS release until after a
one year timeout from their stable releases. Time and memory
may be playing tricks on me here

Finally, being filed in RawHide and in Fedora [note that
no-one cared to uplift those bugs into the F14 product] is NOT
going to get an RFE for RHEL 6 examined and decided, and if
accepted, slotted for stabilization testing and documentation.

File the bug on that product [rhel 6/beta] as well, and
explain why it would be the right thing to do, and what the
needed fix are, (preferably with patches), and why taht is a
low risk, high gain decision, and it will flow into CentOS
faster ;)

-- Russ herrold
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freetype bytecode interpreter
 

On Tue, 2010-07-20 at 13:26 -0400, R P Herrold wrote:
> File the bug on that product [rhel 6/beta] as well, and
> explain why it would be the right thing to do, and what the
> needed fix are, (preferably with patches), and why taht is a
> low risk, high gain decision, and it will flow into CentOS
> faster ;)

As you noted, it sounds like a loser at the present time due to the
apparent bad fonts issue.

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freetype bytecode interpreter
 

On 07/20/2010 10:26 AM, R P Herrold wrote:
>
> Reading that and the companion mentioned in the last comment,
> my takeaway is that fonts in fedora are (or were) bad [I trust
> m miller's judgment here, and have for a long time, as he is
> a thoughtful analyst]

Which fonts? All of the fonts I use on Fedora (pretty much all the
defaults) look significantly better than a default Windows desktop, and
better than OS X, IMO.

Just yesterday I was looking at this:
http://avi.alkalay.net/2007/01/freetype-with-bytecode-interpreter.html

The author believes that the BCI examples are much better. Some of the
examples are maybe slightly better, but mostly just seem awful and
jagged to me. I prefer the AA fonts, with or without BCI. Commenters
appear to largely agree with me.

I'm sure that opinions vary, but I really don't think fonts on Fedora
are bad.
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freetype bytecode interpreter
 

On Tue, 2010-07-20 at 12:46 -0700, Gordon Messmer wrote:
> Which fonts? All of the fonts I use on Fedora (pretty much all the
> defaults) look significantly better than a default Windows desktop,
> and
> better than OS X, IMO.

See the discussion here:

https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=547532

I have never managed to compile the Centos freetype srpm with the
bytecode interpreter enabled.

http://www.mail-archive.com/centos@centos.org/msg45631.html


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freetype bytecode interpreter
 

On Tue, 20 Jul 2010, Gordon Messmer wrote:

> On 07/20/2010 10:26 AM, R P Herrold wrote:
>>
>> Reading that and the companion mentioned in the last comment,
>> my takeaway is that fonts in fedora are (or were) bad [I trust
>> m miller's judgment here, and have for a long time, as he is
>> a thoughtful analyst]
>
> Which fonts?

read the bugs -- I just summarised, and for the reasons stated
in the prior post

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freetype bytecode interpreter
 

On 07/20/2010 01:06 PM, R P Herrold wrote:
>
> read the bugs -- I just summarised, and for the reasons stated
> in the prior post

I did. The bug you linked to said nothing about any specific font. It
referenced another bug in RH Bugzilla where Matthew Miller complained
that freetype with BCI enabled made his fonts *worse*.

So which fonts on Fedora are "bad"?
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freetype bytecode interpreter
 

On 07/20/2010 12:57 PM, Frank Cox wrote:
>
> On Tue, 2010-07-20 at 12:46 -0700, Gordon Messmer wrote:
>> Which fonts? All of the fonts I use on Fedora (pretty much all the
>> defaults) look significantly better than a default Windows desktop,
>> and
>> better than OS X, IMO.
>
> See the discussion here:
> https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=547532

That's the one I mentioned a moment ago: BCI made one of Matthew
Miller's fonts worse. It was perfectly fine with the auto-hinter.
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