ftp.xmission.com/2014.06.ftp.xmission.com.tar/ftp.xmission.com/pub/lists/fractdev/archive/v01.n001

Internet Message Format | 1997-08-14 | 47KB

From: [e-mail] (fractdev Digest)
To: [e-mail]
Subject: fractdev Digest V1 #1
Reply-To: [e-mail]
Sender: [e-mail]
Errors-To: [e-mail]
Precedence:


fractdev Digest        Friday, August 15 1997        Volume 01 : Number 001



In this issue:

    (fractdev) Hello!
    (fractdev) Hello!
    (fractdev) Hello!
    (fractdev) Welcome Dorothy
    (fractdev) When to go public
    (fractdev) When to go public
    Re: (fractdev) When to go public
    Re: (fractdev) When to go public
    Re: (fractdev) Welcome Dorothy
    Re: (fractdev) When to go public
    Re: (fractdev) When to go public
    Re: (fractdev) When to go public
    (fractdev) alive yet?
    Re: (fractdev) alive yet?
    Re: (fractdev) alive yet?
    Re: (fractdev) alive yet?
    Re: (fractdev) alive yet?
    Re: (fractdev) alive yet?
    Re: (fractdev) alive yet?

See the end of the digest for information on subscribing to the fractdev
or fractdev-digest mailing lists and on how to retrieve back issues.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 19:03:56 -0600
From: "Tim Wegner" <[e-mail]>
Subject: (fractdev) Hello!

I see that Lee and Sylvie have arrived. Welcome?

How does it look?

Tim

- ------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks for using Fractdev, The Fractint Developer's Discussion List
Post Message:   [e-mail]
Get Commands:   [e-mail] "help"
Administrator:  [e-mail]
Unsubscribe:    [e-mail] "unsubscribe fractdev"

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 21:54:29 -0400
From: Lee Skinner <[e-mail]>
Subject: (fractdev) Hello!

Tim,

>>I see that Lee and Sylvie have arrived. Welcome?

How does it look?<<

You said that you wanted a critique of the welcome message when it arrive=
d.
The above two lines from you are the only sort of any welcome message tha=
t
I have received.

Lee

- ------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks for using Fractdev, The Fractint Developer's Discussion List
Post Message:   [e-mail]
Get Commands:   [e-mail] "help"
Administrator:  [e-mail]
Unsubscribe:    [e-mail] "unsubscribe fractdev"

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 03:29:32 -0400
From: Sylvie Gallet <[e-mail]>
Subject: (fractdev) Hello!

Hi Tim,

>> I see that Lee and Sylvie have arrived. Welcome?

>> How does it look?

  It looks OK, with one of your favorite typos <g>:

>> You can contact the the fractdev list administrator, Tim =

                   ^^^
  Cheers,

        -  Sylvie

- ------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks for using Fractdev, The Fractint Developer's Discussion List
Post Message:   [e-mail]
Get Commands:   [e-mail] "help"
Administrator:  [e-mail]
Unsubscribe:    [e-mail] "unsubscribe fractdev"

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 09:58:44 -0600
From: "Tim Wegner" <[e-mail]>
Subject: (fractdev) Welcome Dorothy

I see Dorothy Gibbs just joined the two lists. Dorothy, did you get a
welcome message saying you had subscribed and including the list
charter? The message wouldn't have been a message like this, but one
from [e-mail].

The other folks should have also received such a welcome, except one
of the messages was defective. From my compuserve account I
"unjoined" (majordomo won't let me use the right words for this!!)
then "joined" again, and I got the revised welcome messages OK. You
can also get part of the welcome message (the charter part) by
sending

info fractint

or

info fracdev

in a message body (followed by CR) to [e-mail]

(BTW this message bounced because it had the "join" and "unjoin"
commands in it! Since I am resending this, I already know Sylvie is
on the list, but I'll leave the original question below in this
message.)

Sylvie, did you attempt to sign up for the fractint list? I have you
down for only fractdev. The reason I ask is that as soon as I have a
bit more verification that things are working, I'm going to go
public. All the activity will be in fractint. We can use fractdev
temporarily to discuss how things are going with the lists, and
reserve fractint for the actual public discussion. The activity here
in fractdev (besides housekeeping) depends on some internet based
developers coming on board.

Tim





- ------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks for using Fractdev, The Fractint Developer's Discussion List
Post Message:   [e-mail]
Get Commands:   [e-mail] "help"
Administrator:  [e-mail]
Unsubscribe:    [e-mail] "unsubscribe fractdev"

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 16:01:49 -0600
From: "Tim Wegner" <[e-mail]>
Subject: (fractdev) When to go public

I think we're ready to go public, but I want to hear from Rich
Thomson first. The complication is I will be away four days starting
Sunday a week from today. I don't know if one dares to leave a
mailing list unadministered that long :-) It might be prudent to wait
until I come back before we go public. I'll get Rich's opinion.

Is there anyone interested in volunteering to learn the ropes for
this responsibility? It might be for the future rather than for now.
There are only a few commands to learn, and you handle it entirely by
email. What happens is only that bounced mail do to bad addresses and
mis-directed subscribe/unsubscribe commands would come to your email
address.

Having spent an afternoon learning this, I think it's a useful skill
to know how to administer a majordomo list. (I'm not sure
"administer" is the right word, I'm talking about being the owner of
a particular list, not the adminstrator of a whol majordomo software
installation with many lists.)

Tim



- ------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks for using Fractdev, The Fractint Developer's Discussion List
Post Message:   [e-mail]
Get Commands:   [e-mail] "help"
Administrator:  [e-mail]
Unsubscribe:    [e-mail] "unsubscribe fractdev"

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 17:32:42 -0400
From: Sylvie Gallet <[e-mail]>
Subject: (fractdev) When to go public

Tim,

>> Is there anyone interested in volunteering to learn the ropes for =

>> this responsibility? It might be for the future rather than for now. =


  I am interested and I am still on vacation.

        -  Sylvie

- ------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks for using Fractdev, The Fractint Developer's Discussion List
Post Message:   [e-mail]
Get Commands:   [e-mail] "help"
Administrator:  [e-mail]
Unsubscribe:    [e-mail] "unsubscribe fractdev"

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 18:48:37 -0600
From: "Tim Wegner" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: (fractdev) When to go public

Sylvie said:

>   I am interested and I am still on vacation.

I asked Jon Noring about this, and he said that being away several
days is no big deal. However, have a look at

http://docuspace.uchicago.edu/g_maj-adm.html

which is a great summary about what owning a list is all about. From
what Jon says it is sufficient for a few folks on the list to know
I'm not around. It may be in the future we'll want to share this
responsibility, or take turns.

Right now I favor going public after I hear from Rich, probably
Monday.

Tim


- ------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks for using Fractdev, The Fractint Developer's Discussion List
Post Message:   [e-mail]
Get Commands:   [e-mail] "help"
Administrator:  [e-mail]
Unsubscribe:    [e-mail] "unsubscribe fractdev"

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 18:53:28 -0600
From: "Tim Wegner" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: (fractdev) When to go public

Welcome to Les and George!

There's not much here yet. I'm thinking of going public with
the fractint list Monday. For the time being we can use fracdev for
discussing list management mechanics and keep it non-public.

Tim

- ------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks for using Fractdev, The Fractint Developer's Discussion List
Post Message:   [e-mail]
Get Commands:   [e-mail] "help"
Administrator:  [e-mail]
Unsubscribe:    [e-mail] "unsubscribe fractdev"

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 11:23:55 +0100
From: Dorothy Gibbs <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: (fractdev) Welcome Dorothy

In message <[e-mail]>, Tim Wegner
<[e-mail]> writes
>I see Dorothy Gibbs just joined the two lists. Dorothy, did you get a
>welcome message saying you had subscribed and including the list
>charter? The message wouldn't have been a message like this, but one
>from [e-mail].
>
Yes I did thanks.
I look forward to seeing what appears on here now!

Dorothy
- --
Dorothy Gibbs     :In Brookmans Park, Hertfordshire, UK
EMail             :[e-mail]
Compuserve        :100014,1155

- ------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks for using Fractdev, The Fractint Developer's Discussion List
Post Message:   [e-mail]
Get Commands:   [e-mail] "help"
Administrator:  [e-mail]
Unsubscribe:    [e-mail] "unsubscribe fractdev"

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 12:54:17 -0400
From: Sylvie Gallet <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: (fractdev) When to go public

Tim wrote:

>> However, have a look at =

>>
>> http://docuspace.uchicago.edu/g_maj-adm.html
>>
>> which is a great summary about what owning a list is all about.

  I did it.  Interesting!

>> From what Jon says it is sufficient for a few folks on the list to kno=
w =

>> I'm not around. It may be in the future we'll want to share this =

>> responsibility, or take turns.

  I'll be glad to help.

        -  Sylvie

- ------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks for using Fractdev, The Fractint Developer's Discussion List
Post Message:   [e-mail]
Get Commands:   [e-mail] "help"
Administrator:  [e-mail]
Unsubscribe:    [e-mail] "unsubscribe fractdev"

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 18:23:40 -0600
From: "Tim Wegner" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: (fractdev) When to go public

>   I'll be glad to help.

Maybe at some point you can take over one of the list owners (or
for that matter start another sublist, should that be desired.) So
far, the list owner doesn't seem hard at all. Unfortunately at the
moment I don't see a way to share the list owner job.

Everyone, I have changed the procedure for joining the list so it is
now a two step process. When you try to join, you get sent back an
authentication number, which you send back to majordomo. I tried this
from my Compuserve account, and it seems to work fine. If anyone is
curious about this, just unjoin the list and join again. (Notice I'm
avoiding using the right word instead of "join" that starts subsc*
because majordomo will bounce the message back to me if I do <g!>)

The reason for the more complex signup procedure (no, I'll say it,
"subscibe" procedure, I think it's safe this late in the message
<g!>) is to thwart mail bombers which sek out lists, subscribe, and
then broadcasr junk mail.

I'm planning to go public with the fractint list tonight. I'd
appreciate it if several of you would start some discussions
tomorrow on some favorite PARs etc. to get the list going. Don't
worry about this this, I'm only concerned about the fractint list.

Tim


- ------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks for using Fractdev, The Fractint Developer's Discussion List
Post Message:   [e-mail]
Get Commands:   [e-mail] "help"
Administrator:  [e-mail]
Unsubscribe:    [e-mail] "unsubscribe fractdev"

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 19:02:39 -0600
From: "Tim Wegner" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: (fractdev) When to go public

OK, I sent an announcement about the fractint (not the fractdev) list
to fractal-art and to sci.fractals. Here goes nothing!

Tim


- ------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks for using Fractdev, The Fractint Developer's Discussion List
Post Message:   [e-mail]
Get Commands:   [e-mail] "help"
Administrator:  [e-mail]
Unsubscribe:    [e-mail] "unsubscribe fractdev"

------------------------------

Date: Wed, 13 Aug 1997 12:35:17 -0600
From: Rich Thomson <[e-mail]>
Subject: (fractdev) alive yet?

Is this list alive yet, Tim? :)
- --
  ``Between stimulus and response is the will to choose.''  -- Steven Covey
 =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
     3D Paint: The Power to Create in 3D;        Rich Thomson
     email me for more info                [e-mail]

- ------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks for using Fractdev, The Fractint Developer's Discussion List
Post Message:   [e-mail]
Get Commands:   [e-mail] "help"
Administrator:  [e-mail]
Unsubscribe:    [e-mail] "unsubscribe fractdev"

------------------------------

Date: Wed, 13 Aug 1997 18:00:09 -0600
From: "Tim Wegner" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: (fractdev) alive yet?

Rich asked:

> Is this list alive yet, Tim? :)

I haven't made this list public. I'm taking off in a few days to take
my son to college, and at the moment I don't have any non-compuserve
developers knocking at the door waiting, unless you are one <g!>

I can start it at any time if there are people who need to
communicate here. Most of the compuserve developers and artists
belong to this list already, we just haven't started any conversation
here.

It's usually pretty quiet in the summer anyway.

If you have anything to discuss, go ahead <g!>

Tim


- ------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks for using Fractdev, The Fractint Developer's Discussion List
Post Message:   [e-mail]
Get Commands:   [e-mail] "help"
Administrator:  [e-mail]
Unsubscribe:    [e-mail] "unsubscribe fractdev"

------------------------------

Date: Wed, 13 Aug 1997 18:18:54 -0600
From: Rich Thomson <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: (fractdev) alive yet?

In article <[e-mail]> ,
    "Tim Wegner" <[e-mail]>  writes:
> I haven't made this list public. I'm taking off in a few days to take
> my son to college, and at the moment I don't have any non-compuserve
> developers knocking at the door waiting, unless you are one <g!>

Yes, I am :)

> If you have anything to discuss, go ahead <g!>

My skill set is in computer graphics and X/unix environments.  I don't
have a PC compilation environment yet.

Here is a list of things I made earlier when thinking about fractint
and wish lists, etc.  If an item doesn't make sense or you would like
me to talk more about it, please feel free to ask :)

- - better X support:
    - "video modes" for each of the available visual types
    - render into different visuals properly
    - put text screens in X-based windows (i.e. no need for xterm)
    - possibly use a widget set / integrate Motif port

- - enhanced zooming:
    - interpolate / extrapolate zoomed region to init next screen

- - truecolor support:
    - truecolor pixel coloring methods/formulas

- - build abstract layer between UI and calculation engine
    - enhances integration of dos/windows/X versions

- - support for parallelism
    - decompose image into chunks,
      scatter chunks to farm of processors,
      gather rendered chunks

- - file I/O:
    - add batch parameters to GIF file as text comment
    - add JPEG support (parameters as text comment)
    - add PNG support (parameters as text comment)

- - parameterized L-systems
    - a la Prusinkiewicz

- - better 3D support
    - possible use of OpenGL

- - specify any video mode from command line

- - fractal breeder

- - anti-aliasing support

- - prioritized computation of chunks

- - source configured with autoconf
- --
  ``Between stimulus and response is the will to choose.''  -- Steven Covey
 =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
     3D Paint: The Power to Create in 3D;        Rich Thomson
     email me for more info                [e-mail]

- ------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks for using Fractdev, The Fractint Developer's Discussion List
Post Message:   [e-mail]
Get Commands:   [e-mail] "help"
Administrator:  [e-mail]
Unsubscribe:    [e-mail] "unsubscribe fractdev"

------------------------------

Date: Wed, 13 Aug 1997 21:45:18 -0600
From: "Tim Wegner" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: (fractdev) alive yet?

Here are my comments on your list. I should say that my comments
aren't limiting - our openness to ideas is inversely proportional to
the amount of work we have to do to accomodate the ideas :-)

> - better X support:
>     - "video modes" for each of the available visual types
>     - render into different visuals properly
>     - put text screens in X-based windows (i.e. no need for xterm)
>     - possibly use a widget set / integrate Motif port

This would be great. Do you know anything about TK? Darryl House's
opinion was that Motif was too limiting in terms of popularity of the
platform. He agrred that TK might be a good interface to use. We
might even be able to have the same interface under X and
Windows. He did provide me a licensed version of Motif that I can run
under Linux. I know very little about it, but I was able to compile
the XMFract port.

> - enhanced zooming:
>     - interpolate / extrapolate zoomed region to init next screen

Users would love this but for me it's low priority.

> - truecolor support:
>     - truecolor pixel coloring methods/formulas

The foundations of this need to be thought through very carefully.
What are the main parameters we need (iteration, x and y of last
orbit etc.). Format to save image. Procedural algorithms vs super
palettes. Consideration for saving off the fundamental pixel
information and true-coloring as a post process.

For starters, I favor algorithms that interpolate between colors so
that users can explore and color with 256 colors. A lot of work has
been done on this. The fractal-art archives contain discussion, and
there are many code fragments. I'm interested, but so far haven't
taken the time to dive into this. Fractint already has VESA truecolor
drivers built in. High priority.

> - build abstract layer between UI and calculation engine
>     - enhances integration of dos/windows/X versions

Something along these lines is important. Portability is a high
value.

> - support for parallelism
>     - decompose image into chunks,
>       scatter chunks to farm of processors,
>       gather rendered chunks

This is low priority for me because I don't have an environment where
I can use it (or even test it.) But I know it's a priority for you
for go for it. The logic to break things up already exists in "divide
and conquor", the <b> command.

> - file I/O:
>     - add batch parameters to GIF file as text comment
>     - add JPEG support (parameters as text comment)
>     - add PNG support (parameters as text comment)

I'm only inderested in PNG support. When we do PNG we can totally
change how parameters are stored. There is no value IMHO in changing
how data is stored in GIF. Once we support PNG and we're confident of
a conversion process, we can drop GIF (though I'd be willing to let
GIF hand on a while.) I don't see the point in direct JPEG support in
Fractint. PMG can be converted to JPEG as a post-process.

I have worked hard on the PNG team to get medium model support. I
succeeded, but didn't have the time or energy to get PNG into the DOS
fractint. My reluctance is probably due to my deep fear that we'd run
into resource limitations - mostly memory. Integrating PNG into
Fractint under a 32 bit environment would be relatively easy. I have
already reserved a chunk name for fractal data. My idea is to define
PNG-like subchunks for various fractal items. However, PAR-like text
might be better.

I *should* reserve a coule of weekends to integrate PNG under DOS. I
might even succeed!

>
> - parameterized L-systems
>     - a la Prusinkiewicz

I don't know too much about this. I know there are some great
3D L-systems that work with POV-Ray.

>
> - better 3D support
>     - possible use of OpenGL

The existing 3D is truly horrible code, but after all this time it's
still pretty popular. I wrote it from first principles with no
experience or previous knowledge, and it shows. I quit when I got it
working. Today it excites me less, with one exception. The
4D quaternion and hypercomplex types fascinate me. It would be easy
to improve the julibrot depth modulation, and have some pseudo-3D
rendering. The 3D fractals have been implemented with a bit more
generality (arbitrary slicing places) in POV-Ray. I'd like to make a
direct connection between Fractint and POV-Ray so Fractint could be
an exploration toold for POV-Ray. I'd also like to connect the 2D
quaternion and hypercomplex fractals with the 4D ones so that the 2D
ones could be used to explore. (This is possible now by hand, but you
have to know what you are doing.)

At this point I don't see how OpenGL helps with Fractint's 3D because
of the nature of fractals. But I'm open to learn at the feet of an
expert <g!> This probably needs a Windows port to do on the PC end.

> - specify any video mode from command line

The DOS version does this. I agree it's a big weakness of the
Xfractint version.

> - fractal breeder

Robin's evolver is a great start toward this. I need to upgrade Linux
to the latest developer version so you can see. The latest Fractint
executable is in

ftp.phoenix.net/pub/users/twegner/tw01.zip

This isn't secret but I'm not ready to send dveloper versions out to
the public with big publicity. Anyone who sees this, please don't
upload this anywhere else, as developer versions have a short life.

Your other ideas would be welcome as well.

Be patient with us. I find the pace of my own develper contributions
has slowed a lot, but by the same token, I have learned to keep
things in balance so I can maintain my fractint participation for the
long haul. I generally do end up implementing things I talk about
wanting to do, but it can take years <g!>

The biggest issue is how to get out from under DOS. One of
the big obstacles is that we have ported all the assembler already,
but users LOVE the fast assembler. We need a Windows port (preferably
done with a portable GUI built with TK or some such) that has some of
the assembler ported, particularly the fast parser and
Mandlbrot/Julia.

Having said all this, what I should personally do next is take some
time and finish off SOI (Synchronous Orbits) and port it to arbitrary
precision. Or I could drop it and tackle PNG. Or I should buy Visual
C++. Or I should plunge into TK under Linux, which means I need a new
hard drive. You see my problem <ggg!>

George Martin pretty much focuses on the formula parser. Jonathan is
working at the moment on memory management and helping Robin with the
evolver. Nobody in this effort as any deadlines. Like me, they work
slowly as schedule permits. Wes Loewer has gone to Kenya to
teach. Bert Tyler lurks <g!>

Tim






- ------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks for using Fractdev, The Fractint Developer's Discussion List
Post Message:   [e-mail]
Get Commands:   [e-mail] "help"
Administrator:  [e-mail]
Unsubscribe:    [e-mail] "unsubscribe fractdev"

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 12:02:00 -0600
From: Rich Thomson <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: (fractdev) alive yet?

In article <[e-mail]> ,
    "Tim Wegner" <[e-mail]>  writes:
> > - better X support:
>
> This would be great. Do you know anything about TK? Darryl House's
> opinion was that Motif was too limiting in terms of popularity of the
> platform. He agrred that TK might be a good interface to use. We
> might even be able to have the same interface under X and
> Windows. He did provide me a licensed version of Motif that I can run
> under Linux. I know very little about it, but I was able to compile
> the XMFract port.

I don't know much about Tk.  When I was thinking of a widget set, I
was thinking of the 3D athena widgets, which are freely available
source code and widely available.  Fractint doesn't need very much in
the way of user interface widgets.  As for having the same interface
on Windows as X, this was what I was referring to later in my mail
about separating the UI from the calculation engine with some sort of
abstract layer.  While windowing systems like X and Win32 provide many
functions and ways of creating a user interface, fractint's needs are
really quite pedestrian.  Help screens, parameter dialogs, file
selectors, and a graphics output screen.

I do know that Tk is built on top of Tcl.  In the past, I have had a
hard time installing Tk/Tcl based applications because it requires
that so many other things be installed first in a certain way.  Maybe
it was just the way they were packaged.  I'm not a Tcl expert.  I have
been reading about how the FSF (Free Software Foundation, the gnu
folks) have rebelled against Tcl and instead are proposing an
alternative scripting tool.  Is it possible to distribute a
"standalone" Tk/Tcl-based application?  Or does it always require the
user install something else first?  For window system oriented
versions of fractint, I'd like it to be as standalone as possible.

> > - enhanced zooming:
> >     - interpolate / extrapolate zoomed region to init next screen
>
> Users would love this but for me it's low priority.

The code should be fairly easy to add, though.  Its a doubly nested
loop and some pixel I/O.

> > - truecolor support:
> >     - truecolor pixel coloring methods/formulas
>
> The foundations of this need to be thought through very carefully.

Yep :)

Here are some of my thoughts in the questions you raise:

> What are the main parameters we need (iteration, x and y of last
> orbit etc.).

That's a good start.

> Format to save image.

PNG or GIF (floyd-steinberg dither on the resulting 24-bit image to
"best" 256 colors).

> Procedural algorithms vs super
> palettes.

My thoughts were to allow both by supporting a "coloring formula".  To
get super palettes, your formula is just a colormap lookup:

    truecolor=map[iter]

> Consideration for saving off the fundamental pixel
> information and true-coloring as a post process.

Isn't this in fractint 19.6 right now?

> I favor algorithms that interpolate between colors so
> that users can explore and color with 256 colors.

Can you elaborate on what you mean here?

> A lot of work has
> been done on this. The fractal-art archives contain discussion, and
> there are many code fragments. I'm interested, but so far haven't
> taken the time to dive into this. Fractint already has VESA truecolor
> drivers built in. High priority.

I'm not familiar with those discussions; has anyone collected them
together so they could be reposted to fractdev?

> > - build abstract layer between UI and calculation engine
> >     - enhances integration of dos/windows/X versions
>
> Something along these lines is important. Portability is a high
> value.

Yes, this makes doing the "X port" much, much easier.  Also, things
are looking really interesting with the folks at Be Inc. having
announced an Intel port coming.  (See <URL: http://www.be.com>.)  The
BeOS is a totally different UI model, so having the UI separated
cleanly from the computation engine would make things easier.

> > - support for parallelism
> >     - decompose image into chunks,
> >       scatter chunks to farm of processors,
> >       gather rendered chunks
>
> This is low priority for me because I don't have an environment where
> I can use it (or even test it.) But I know it's a priority for you
> for go for it. The logic to break things up already exists in "divide
> and conquor", the <b> command.

Cool.  This might become more popular than you think!  Seeing as how
winsock is widely available on people's machines nowadays, their might
be a way to coordinate different machines over the internet to
cooperatively render fractals.  Another advantage of having the UI
cleanly separated from the calculation engine is that a network
compute node can simply have its UI replaced with a network "stub".

> > - file I/O:
>
> I'm only inderested in PNG support. [...]

> There is no value IMHO in changing how data is stored in GIF.

What I was suggesting is that we keep the application extension block
but also add a par definition style text comment as well.  (If you
extract the printable comments with a GIF utility, then you have the
par file without having to load the file into fractint.)

> I don't see the point in direct JPEG support in
> Fractint. PMG can be converted to JPEG as a post-process.

Here is why I think direct JPEG support is important in fractint's
future:

    o   PNG images, while pixel correct, tend to be much larger than
    JPEGs.  I know people always say "trade the par file", but with
    deep zooming and images that take 5 days to render on a
    Pentium II, I'd rather trade the image!  Trading JPEGs is
    easier on the modem/bandwidth than trading PNGs.

    o   PNG -> JPEG conversion gets you the image, but loses the
    parameter information that generated the image.  This is
    already a reason why people complain about using JPEG for
    trading fractint fractals.  The parameters could easily be
    embedded in the JPEG file just as easily as the GIF.

    o   When truecolor support is added, the images should exhibit
    less of the Gibbs Phenomenon that makes so many people object
    to JPEG.

    o   Choice is good :)

> I have worked hard on the PNG team to get medium model support.

What's medium model support?

> My reluctance is probably due to my deep fear that we'd run
> into resource limitations - mostly memory.

I don't have a feel for what the memory budget of fractint is right
now.  I'm still trying to understand the layout of the source code :).
I did notice that fractint is using overlays?  If someone could post a
rough memory map of DOS fractint's memory usage, that might be
helpful.

> Integrating PNG into
> Fractint under a 32 bit environment would be relatively easy.

Is it an option to include features (say, PNG & JPEG support) in some
ports but not others?  For instance, let DOS have only GIF I/O, to be
eventually replaced by PNG, but no other file formats.  Or does this
lead to an unhappy divergence among platforms?

> PNG-like subchunks for various fractal items. However, PAR-like text
> might be better.

I like PAR-like text because it can easily be extracted from whatever
file its embedded in (the unix "strings" command, for instance, can
extract printable strings from arbitrary binary data).

> > - parameterized L-systems
> >     - a la Prusinkiewicz
>
> I don't know too much about this. I know there are some great
> 3D L-systems that work with POV-Ray.

The best reference on this is "The Algorithmic Beauty of Plants", by
P. Prusinkiewicz -- and no, I'm not sure I've spelled his name right
:).  Parameterized L-systems allow you to evolve an L-system
continuously rather than as discrete polygonalized steps.  Its how
P.P. generated beautiful animations of growing plants from seedling to
mature plant to flowering stages and so on.  Great stuff.

> > - better 3D support
> >     - possible use of OpenGL
>
> The existing 3D is truly horrible code, but after all this time it's
> still pretty popular.

:)

I think this is another case where a clear interface for the 3D
features used by fractint would be a win.  There are a wide variety of
3D rendering devices/APIs available.  If fractint can clearly define a
base set of operations that it uses in its 3D rendering, then we should
be able to have fractint rendering its 3D output in a variety of
ways.  I would even think that 3D file output should be subsumed
within that paradigm.

> I'd also like to connect the 2D
> quaternion and hypercomplex fractals with the 4D ones so that the 2D
> ones could be used to explore. (This is possible now by hand, but you
> have to know what you are doing.)

Can you explain more of this mechanism?  I'm not familiar with POV-ray
(guess I need to download it!)

> At this point I don't see how OpenGL helps with Fractint's 3D because
> of the nature of fractals. But I'm open to learn at the feet of an
> expert <g!> This probably needs a Windows port to do on the PC end.

On many unix boxes (and soon PC boxes too, under Win95), OpenGL
rendering is more featureful and has higher performance than rendering
through the window system mechanism.  For instance, OpenGL supports
the idea of images with transparency channels, whereas X does not.  (I
don't know if Win32 supports RGBA pixels though.)

> > - specify any video mode from command line
>
> The DOS version does this. I agree it's a big weakness of the
> Xfractint version.

I think the DOS version lets you only specify video modes that are
tied to a function key?  What if you want to select a video mode that
isn't tied to a function key?  Can it be selected without changing the
key mapping first?

> > - fractal breeder
>
> Robin's evolver is a great start toward this.

Yes, I cheered inside when I saw you mention this on the fractint list
:)

I have some thoughts on the concept, but I'd like to go into them in a
separate message as this one is already too long! :)

> The biggest issue is how to get out from under DOS. One of
> the big obstacles is that we have ported all the assembler already,
> but users LOVE the fast assembler. We need a Windows port (preferably
> done with a portable GUI built with TK or some such) that has some of
> the assembler ported, particularly the fast parser and
> Mandlbrot/Julia.

How does DOS assembler differ from Windows assembler?  You lost me
there :).  I have been writing software since 1978, but never learned
much detail about programming under DOS.

> Having said all this, what I should personally do next is take some
> time and finish off SOI (Synchronous Orbits) and port it to arbitrary
> precision. Or I could drop it and tackle PNG. Or I should buy Visual
> C++. Or I should plunge into TK under Linux, which means I need a new
> hard drive. You see my problem <ggg!>

I would suggest finishing SOI, and we could work on PNG together or
something, I dunno :).  SOI seems more important than those other
things, but what do I know, I'm just getting up to speed <g>.

                        -- Rich
- --
  ``Between stimulus and response is the will to choose.''  -- Steven Covey
 =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
     3D Paint: The Power to Create in 3D;        Rich Thomson
     email me for more info                [e-mail]

- ------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks for using Fractdev, The Fractint Developer's Discussion List
Post Message:   [e-mail]
Get Commands:   [e-mail] "help"
Administrator:  [e-mail]
Unsubscribe:    [e-mail] "unsubscribe fractdev"

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 15 Aug 1997 01:31:30 +0100
From: robin bussell <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: (fractdev) alive yet?

Rich Thomson wrote:
>
> > > - fractal breeder
> >
> > Robin's evolver is a great start toward this.
>
> Yes, I cheered inside when I saw you mention this on the fractint list
> :)
>
> I have some thoughts on the concept, but I'd like to go into them in a
> separate message as this one is already too long! :)

Please do! I've been wanting to have some good meaty discussions about
this for ages, at the moment I hope I've made things fairly tweakable.
It's based around an array of structures which have pointers to
variables and corresponding functions to mutate those variables. The
interface is the main thing that can do with beefing up, it'd be great
to have lots of control panel windows available on screen at once for
tweaking things and displaying the underlying mutations... definately
better implemented in a windowed environment.

Looking forward to your ideas, especially as regards some form of proper
breeding between mutations.

Cheers,
     Robin.




>
> > The biggest issue is how to get out from under DOS. One of
> > the big obstacles is that we have ported all the assembler already,
> > but users LOVE the fast assembler. We need a Windows port (preferably
> > done with a portable GUI built with TK or some such) that has some of
> > the assembler ported, particularly the fast parser and
> > Mandlbrot/Julia.
>
> How does DOS assembler differ from Windows assembler?  You lost me
> there :).  I have been writing software since 1978, but never learned
> much detail about programming under DOS.
>
> > Having said all this, what I should personally do next is take some
> > time and finish off SOI (Synchronous Orbits) and port it to arbitrary
> > precision. Or I could drop it and tackle PNG. Or I should buy Visual
> > C++. Or I should plunge into TK under Linux, which means I need a new
> > hard drive. You see my problem <ggg!>
>
> I would suggest finishing SOI, and we could work on PNG together or
> something, I dunno :).  SOI seems more important than those other
> things, but what do I know, I'm just getting up to speed <g>.
>
>                                                 -- Rich
> --
>   ``Between stimulus and response is the will to choose.''  -- Steven Covey
>  =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
>      3D Paint: The Power to Create in 3D;               Rich Thomson
>      email me for more info                             [e-mail]
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> Thanks for using Fractdev, The Fractint Developer's Discussion List
> Post Message:   [e-mail]
> Get Commands:   [e-mail] "help"
> Administrator:  [e-mail]
> Unsubscribe:    [e-mail] "unsubscribe fractdev"

- ------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks for using Fractdev, The Fractint Developer's Discussion List
Post Message:   [e-mail]
Get Commands:   [e-mail] "help"
Administrator:  [e-mail]
Unsubscribe:    [e-mail] "unsubscribe fractdev"

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 15 Aug 1997 12:52:47 -0600
From: Rich Thomson <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: (fractdev) alive yet?

I wrote:
> > I have some thoughts on the concept, but I'd like to go into them in a
> > separate message as this one is already too long! :)

In article <[e-mail]>,
    robin bussell <[e-mail]>  replies:
> Please do! [...]

Are you familiar with William Latham's book "Evolutionary Art and
Computers"?  (He has a web site at <URL:
http://www.artworks.co.uk/home.html>.)  This is where most of my
inspiration comes from; that and the fractal evolver control panel in
Kai's Power Tools.

Now to get a little more specific on fractint.

Consider the parameter set that reproduces an image to be its
"genome".  Within each parameter set, I would classify the variables
into the following categories, in order of significance:

    type
    Lots of other parameters only make sense for certain types of
    fractals.  p1 may set a bailout value for one type and a
    perturbation parameter for another type

    rendering parameters
    These are parameters that control the computation of the
    fractal (usually expressed as a per-pixel iteration count,
    but for other fractal types may mean something different
    such as the number of points to compute in an IFS).  Most
    of them are on the x, y, and z screens.

    coloring parameters
    inside, outside, colormap, etc.

    viewing parameters
    (for 3d fractals where one can change perspectives)

Now if you are familiar with the evolver panel in KPT, you might see
where I am going with this.  A fractal can be "mutated" in a number of
ways, some of which have subtle effects on the image (i.e. only a
colormap change), whereas changing the fractal type can result in a
somewhat rude mutation. :)  A "mutation level" control should let you
restrict the mutation to one of the classes listed above.  For mild
mutations you might just want to change the colormap only.  For
"medium" mutations you might want to change various parameters from
the x,y,z screens.  For huge mutations, you are basically asking
fractint to generate random collections of par values from its
repetoire and display them.

Now the above discussion operates from an "asexual" reproduction
model.  This is similar to the evolver panel in KPT, where the
"parent" is shown in the center of a 3x3 grid of images:

                +--------+--------+--------+
                |        |        |        |
                | Child  | Child  | Child  |
                | 1      | 2      | 3      |
                +--------+--------+--------+
                |        | Parent |        |
                | Child  |        | Child  |
                | 4      |        | 5      |
                +--------+--------+--------+
                |        |        |        |
                | Child  | Child  | Child  |
                | 6      | 7      | 8      |
                +--------+--------+--------+

Each of the child images is a mutation from the parent; how much a
mutation is controlled by a "mutagenic tree" control on the KPT
evolver panel.

This is different from Latham's scheme of evolved forms where the
"gardener" selects various forms for cross-breeding.  The resultant
offspring have characteristics of both parents.

I'm not sure I know how to incorporate this kind of paradigm into
fractint, but it might be possible to experiment outside of fractint
by writing a program that manipulates PAR files only to experiment
with the idea.  The PAR files could then be rendered in 19.6 to
examine the results.  Not exactly interactive, but at least it would
provide you with a testbed.

Now, onto some ideas about implementation:

The "mutation level" control determines the maximum level of mutation
that can occur between parent and child.  Let's suppose this is an
integer called mutation_level.  Next, generate the mutation threshold
for each of the child images, a random integer between 1 and
mutation_level, inclusive.  (A mutation threshold of 0 would indicate
no change from the parent.)  Now we take each child image's threshold
and mutate any parameters that fall below the threshold.  A more
restrictive approach might mutate only a single parameter, or mutate
the parameter by an amount in proportion to the difference between the
image's threshold and the parameter's threshold.

Some experimentation is probably needed to pick one method that works
well.  I think its best not to flood the user with too many controls
they barely understand; the point of the evolver is to do away with
understanding the parameters and navigate the multi-dimensional
parameter space visually.

Now, having said all that, there is another, distinct way of looking
at the mutation.  View the genome of the fractal as a collection of
bits.  Based on the mutation level, pick a fraction of the bits to be
changed during the mutation process.  The mutation process changes the
bits and generates the new child fractal from the mutated parameter
set.  This method treats all the bits in the genome as identical
candidates for permutation (and thus perhaps ought not to include
fractal type).  An implementation might choose to use its internal
binary data structure as the "genome" -- probably along with a bit
mask to indicates which portions of the data structure are
contributing bits to the genome.

The latter approach has a certain simplicity that makes it attractive,
but it doesn't appeal to me as much.  I like the idea that the evolver
would understand that some parameters are for very low-level mutations
and others are only to be used when you crank up the mutation
control.  The anonymous genome bit approach can only approach this by
changing more bits in the genome when the mutation control is cranked
up.  At any rate, those are my thoughts on the idea.
- --
  ``Between stimulus and response is the will to choose.''  -- Steven Covey
 =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
     3D Paint: The Power to Create in 3D;        Rich Thomson
     email me for more info                [e-mail]

- ------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks for using Fractdev, The Fractint Developer's Discussion List
Post Message:   [e-mail]
Get Commands:   [e-mail] "help"
Administrator:  [e-mail]
Unsubscribe:    [e-mail] "unsubscribe fractdev"

------------------------------

End of fractdev Digest V1 #1
****************************

To subscribe to fractdev Digest, send the command:

    subscribe fractdev-digest

in the body of a message to "[e-mail]".  If you want to
subscribe something other than the account the mail is coming from, such
as a local redistribution list, then append that address to the
"subscribe" command; for example, to subscribe "local-fractdev":

    subscribe fractdev-digest [e-mail]

A non-digest (direct mail) version of this list is also available; to
subscribe to that instead, replace all instances of "fractdev-digest"
in the commands above with "fractdev".

Back issues are available for anonymous FTP from ftp.xmission.com, in
pub/lists/fractdev/archive.  These are organized by date.