Vector Graphics

[Programmer]

Yea, I think you cracked it. No sign of Auntie Alias coming to visit there at all!

[Programmer]

BTW, if you wanted to dig a bit more into the documentation about how that DLL actually works here is a link to the developer's homepage: https://svg.codeplex.com/. I must admit I haven't had time to look at it myself. As you've realized I don't have any background knowledge of how these kind of graphics actually work so it would be a bit too much of a learning curve to try and get my head round it right now.

[Greg the Yeti]

Hi,
thanks for that link. It's interesting.

I note that the most recent release of the dll is in 2008 which is seven years ago.
I also note that their expressed intention was to make SVG available on the web, but only until the big browsers became compatible. Since they now are compatible. it may be quite likely that they will not develop it further?

I've registered on codeplex and will feedback what I've observed, and make relevant suggestions there to see if I can encourage a useful response!

1) To continue development until Windows has SVG built in and Explorer can preview SVG files.
2) To make "Auntie Alias" an optional guest!
3) To improve rendering quality up to the standard now in IE and Firefox.

I note a "branch" of the project at https://github.com/vvvv/SVG, who seem to have done more recent work. Unfortunately it looks to be harder to contribute there (paid for subscriptions, speaking in GeekSpeek etc...)

regards
Greg the Yeti

Edit:
Following that link in Github to the vvvv website and downloading some packages of DLLs there to see if I could find a more up to date one, my anti-virus flagged one as definitely unsafe - not encouraging!!
So I'm not sure if I can trust anything from "vvvv"?

[Greg the Yeti]

Hi Richard,
another day, another hunch...

I don't know why it has taken me so long to work this out, but I may have the reason why the vector graphics (that you worked so hard on last year!) didn't give the results that they SHOULD have done.

As far as I am aware ALL vector graphics formats ( SVG, CDR and the Illustrator format AI I think ) contain a lowish resolution bitmap to act as a "Thumbnail", for display in Windows explorer etc.

My hunch of the day is that the dll you were using is simply intended for this purpose - to allow that thumbnail to be displayed to give an idea of what is contained in the file? This would certainly be a "Cheat", and certainly wouldn't give the quality of result which one would be expecting of the Vector Format.

Now that's exactly what we saw with that svg.dll !

I still think that if it were possible to use the engine of either Internet Explorer or Firefox/Mozilla, that should give perfect results, since both those programs display SVG perfectly!

I know for a fact that some programs are doing that - using the Internet Explorer engine for the display of Internet files. (eg - In discussion with the makers of "PowerDesk Pro", Avanquest, they admitted that to me.) Perhaps that would be a cost option? Perhaps not? Perhaps the Programing Language you're using (C++ is it?) contains that engine, since it's so ubiquitous, and thus it would be already paid for?

Perhaps all that would be required would be to get the software to display the SVG file "as if it were an internet file" - which is what the format was originally designed for after all. All I know is that if you shove an SVG into IE you get perfect display! Same with firefox.

Would this be possible? If it were it might be very easy???

I hope this might help at some time, if you have the inclination to do some more thought on this...

Regards Greg

P.S.
I have spectres entering my mind of whether the whole program could be made to work within a browser, online?? Orphalese as a "Service"??
Whether using the "Internet Display" of ALL the graphics would help in the integration with Linux??

[Programmer]

Hi Greg,

It is always great to see your "out of the box" thought process at work!

It may be right that using a web browser as the actual face of the card would be the best way to get the best image, but let me explain why I am not really interested in pursuing it further at the moment.

First I thought that in terms of the image scaling itself the results were pretty good, for example with that "Awesome Tiger" deck I was doing the tests with it seemed to resize the image pretty well. I know there were problems combining the vector graphics with transparency but that is a different story. On the other hand I thought what was bad about it was the time it took to load the images. It was taking too much of a hit on the program and it was slow to move the cards round the screen. As you commented earlier in the thread that is something that won't be an issue one day but at the moment I think it would be enough to stop people using one of these decks.

Probably this is partly why nobody else has expressed any interest in this format. If there was a big clamor of people asking for this feature I could maybe see it, but in fact you are the only person who ever posted about it on this forum. So then I have to set that against the risk of adding in little used features that might cause unintended problems with popular features that lots of people use. For example, each card would have a web browser as well as a picture box which is what paints the card image at the moment. So you could hide the browser when the card was any other format except .svg, but it would certainly effect the performance because the control would still require some basic initialization even if it wasn't ever shown.

On the other hand the idea of making the whole program web based (or rather making a web based version of the program) is very interesting indeed but there is no way I would have time to do that now, I would see that as a project involving a year or more of initial development time at least. And is that really likely to be more in demand than a mobile app version (something else I don't have time to do)? I probably get one or two inquiries a month about a mobile version compared to one or two a year for a web version. So it is that really, just trying to put the resources where they will be most appreciated. But do keep the ideas coming!

[Greg the Yeti]

Hi Richard,
yes I quite understand what you say, and this is not a priority!

Actually I must have had a "brainstorm" on the day I wrote the above. When I wrote
"Now that's exactly what we saw with that svg.dll !"
This wasn't in fact true!

In fact, earlier on in the SVG saga, the errors which were showing could ONLY have occured if the program was in fact trying to display the proper Vector information. It was just not doing very well...
Later on the problem was of the quality of the graphic, which was not up to what Vector Graphics is capable...
That COULD have been due to displaying the "Thumbnail", rather than trying to display the Vector information????

Despite this, I think my ideas above are still relevant (and you seem to have liked them in principle).

I think what you said means that the ball is back in my court...
I had put off producing a full vector version of a standard Marseille Deck - untill the SVG dll could do better.
Now I think it's up to me to get the Deck done to show that it would be useful, and should have the possibility of "Ultra Quality" with smaller file size!

Notwhithstanding my health problems (especially that RSI injury) I will try to get that done, just don't wait up!!!

Regards Greg