523 lines
31 KiB
HTML
523 lines
31 KiB
HTML
<!doctype html public "-//w3c//dtd html 4.0 transitional//en">
|
|
<html>
|
|
<head>
|
|
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">
|
|
<meta name="GENERATOR" content="Mozilla/4.51 [en] (X11; I; Linux 2.0.36 i586) [Netscape]">
|
|
<title>Graphics Muse
|
|
</title>
|
|
</head>
|
|
<body text="#000000" bgcolor="#FFFFFF" link="#660000" vlink="#666666" alink="#FF6600">
|
|
<!-- =============================================================
|
|
These pages are designed by Michael J. Hammel. Permission to
|
|
use all graphics and other content is granted provided you give
|
|
me (or the original authors/artists) credit for the work and this
|
|
copyright notice is not removed.
|
|
|
|
(c)1997, 1998 Michael J. Hammel (mjhammel@graphics-muse.org)
|
|
============================================================= !-->
|
|
<br><img SRC="images/musings.jpg" height=50 width=245>
|
|
<table WIDTH="100%" >
|
|
<tr>
|
|
<td ALIGN=RIGHT WIDTH="100%"><font size=-2>© 1999 <a href="mailto:mjhammel@graphics-muse.org">Michael
|
|
J. Hammel</a></font></td>
|
|
</tr>
|
|
|
|
<tr>
|
|
<td VALIGN=TOP BGCOLOR="#000000" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><img SRC="images/cleardot.gif" ALT="indent" align=LEFT></td>
|
|
</tr>
|
|
</table>
|
|
|
|
<table BORDER=0 COLS=3 WIDTH="100%" NOSAVE >
|
|
<tr NOSAVE>
|
|
<td ALIGN=LEFT VALIGN=TOP WIDTH="140" NOSAVE>
|
|
<table BORDER CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=2 COLS=1 WIDTH="100%" HEIGHT="100%" BGCOLOR="#FE992B" NOSAVE >
|
|
<tr NOSAVE>
|
|
<td NOSAVE><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1><a href="#A Follow Up to Vector Drawing Tools on Linux">A
|
|
Follow Up to Vector Drawing Tools on Linux</a></font></font></td>
|
|
</tr>
|
|
|
|
<tr>
|
|
<td><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1><a href="#A Little Eye-Candy, Please (continued)">A
|
|
Little Eye Candy, Please (continued)</a></font></font></td>
|
|
</tr>
|
|
</table>
|
|
</td>
|
|
|
|
<td WIDTH="1" NOSAVE></td>
|
|
|
|
<td ALIGN=LEFT VALIGN=TOP NOSAVE>
|
|
<table BORDER=0 CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=3 COLS=1 WIDTH="100%" NOSAVE >
|
|
<tr>
|
|
<td><b><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=+1>more musings...</font></font></b></td>
|
|
</tr>
|
|
</table>
|
|
</td>
|
|
</tr>
|
|
</table>
|
|
|
|
<hr SIZE=1 NOSHADE WIDTH="100%">
|
|
<br><a NAME="A Follow Up to Vector Drawing Tools on Linux"></a><b><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=+1>A
|
|
Follow Up to Vector Drawing Tools on Linux</font></font></b>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1>I received a lot of email
|
|
in response to my article on Vector Drawing tools for Linux. That's
|
|
good - it's really the only way I know anyone really reads this stuff.
|
|
Fortunately, it was all positive feedback, some praise and a lot of helpful
|
|
hints relating to the tools I discussed. Here is some of the email
|
|
I received, and my responses to them.</font></font>
|
|
<p>
|
|
<hr SIZE=1 NOSHADE WIDTH="85%">
|
|
<br><u><font face="Arial,Helvetica">One package I missed: ImPress</font></u>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#990000"><font size=-1>I'll
|
|
admit that ImPress has some bugs. Please give it a try sometime.</font></font></font>
|
|
<br><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#990000"><font size=-1><a href="http://www.ntlug.org/~ccox/impress/index.html">http://www.ntlug.org/~ccox/impress/index.html</a></font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#990000"><font size=-1>Regards,</font></font></font>
|
|
<br><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#990000"><font size=-1>Chris</font></font></font>
|
|
<br><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#990000"><font size=-1><a href="mailto:ccox@acm.org">ccox@acm.org</a></font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1><b><font color="#993300">'Muse:</font></b>
|
|
Whoa. I didn't even know that ImPress was a vector tool. So
|
|
much for my research capabilities. I downloaded it and took a quick
|
|
look. I have to say, this may be the simplest tool of the bunch.
|
|
For someone who wants to create simple diagrams and then print them out,
|
|
this may just be the tool. It has a simple interface that includes
|
|
all the basic shapes you might want, plus support for embedded text and
|
|
Postscript output. It's not nearly as full featured as the TGIF or
|
|
XFig, but it is simple to use and requires no special configuration.
|
|
It doesn't even require compiling - it's a Tcl/Tk script! Very impressive.
|
|
Here are a few screen shots.</font></font>
|
|
<br>
|
|
<center><table BORDER=0 CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=4 NOSAVE >
|
|
<tr NOSAVE>
|
|
<td NOSAVE>
|
|
<center><img SRC="images/impress-1.gif" height=276 width=559></center>
|
|
</td>
|
|
|
|
<td>
|
|
<center><img SRC="images/impress-2.gif" height=308 width=94></center>
|
|
</td>
|
|
</tr>
|
|
|
|
<tr>
|
|
<td>
|
|
<center><b><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=+1>Impress main window</font></font></b></center>
|
|
</td>
|
|
|
|
<td>
|
|
<center><b><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=+1>Toolbox</font></font></b></center>
|
|
</td>
|
|
</tr>
|
|
</table></center>
|
|
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1>The downloadable package
|
|
doesn't include much in the way of documentation, unfortunately.
|
|
The Web site only contains HTML-ized versions of the documentation that
|
|
comes with the package. But this small amount of documentation should
|
|
still be enough to get you moving pretty quickly in this package.
|
|
I did note that at least one part of the documentation was wrong:
|
|
double clicking on the color palette entry in the main dialog doesn't bring
|
|
up the color editing dialog. You need to double click on the Fill
|
|
button instead. Minor detail. The program still works pretty
|
|
good.</font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1>My only question: how
|
|
did Chris get those pictures of Tux and the dinosaur into his example?
|
|
The dinosaur looks like it might be clip art (vector graphics), but the
|
|
Tux image looks like an imported raster graphic. There doesn't appear
|
|
to be a raster import feature in the version I have. Maybe its something
|
|
under development.</font></font>
|
|
<p>
|
|
<hr SIZE=1 NOSHADE WIDTH="80%">
|
|
<br><u><font face="Arial,Helvetica">KIllustrator</font></u>
|
|
<ol>
|
|
<li>
|
|
<font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>Killustrator
|
|
requires egcs 1.x OR gcc 2.8 since gcc 2.7.2 is so very broken for C++
|
|
code (ie no ANSI compliance). Not a problen on Redhat 5.x, since
|
|
the default C++ compiler on Redhat is egcs, and gcc is only for C code,
|
|
especially the old stable kernel series. 2.0.x</font></font></font></li>
|
|
|
|
<li>
|
|
<font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>With KDE
|
|
installed already on my system, it was a standard source code install with
|
|
./configure ; make ; make install working flawlessly. (for 0.6.3 , there
|
|
are later versions)</font></font></font></li>
|
|
|
|
<li>
|
|
<font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>It imports
|
|
Xfig drawings, apparantly, and exports GIF, eps, ppm, and xpm (it may support
|
|
more, but I don't have for instance tiff or png development libraries installed,
|
|
so configure may simple have selected to use those installed.) It also
|
|
saves to its own (XML?) based format.</font></font></font></li>
|
|
|
|
<li>
|
|
<font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>For running
|
|
KDE applications you need the Qt libraries and the KDE libraries, nothing
|
|
more. To compile them Qt-devel, and kdesupport packages are needed.</font></font></font></li>
|
|
|
|
<li>
|
|
<font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>For a
|
|
full KDE install, install packages in the order Qt, kdesupport, kdelibs,
|
|
all others in any order {kdebase, kdegames, kdegraphics, kdenetwork, korgransier,
|
|
klyx, kdeutils, kdetoys, kdemultimedia}</font></font></font></li>
|
|
|
|
<li>
|
|
<font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>Killustrator
|
|
was designed from the start as a KDE application so its unlikely to be
|
|
uncoupled. (unlike Gimp, which precedes GNOME). It only needs the kdelibraries
|
|
and Qt - it will happily run on any X11 system with them installed. Its
|
|
also the vector graphics package for the KDE office suite, and I think
|
|
0.6.x is the last release which will have a compile time option of running
|
|
without koffice support. (The website might need checked for that one)</font></font></font></li>
|
|
|
|
<li>
|
|
<font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>As its
|
|
a koffice application, it can be emabedded in other applications using
|
|
the KOM/OP corba orb, which is usable independent of Qt and KDE, so it
|
|
may be possible to embed killustrator in another application understanding
|
|
KOM/OP. ie as is done throughout koffice (SuSE 6.1 has an alpha release
|
|
included)</font></font></font></li>
|
|
</ol>
|
|
<font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>George
|
|
Russell</font></font></font>
|
|
<br><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1><a href="mailto:george.russell@clara.net">george.russell@clara.net</a></font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1><b><font color="#993300">'Muse:</font></b>
|
|
This was very helpful information, especially the bit about what libraries
|
|
are needed to run and what libraries are needed to compile KDE applications.
|
|
Unfortunately, since it appears that KIllustrator is being tied to another
|
|
suite of tools (KDE Office Suite), I doubt I'll try it myself. I
|
|
don't need all those other pieces. Maybe they'll be part of the next
|
|
full distribution I purchase, in which case I'll take a look at them then.
|
|
I just don't feel like downloading huge amounts of stuff I won't really
|
|
use anyway.</font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>Your
|
|
comments about KIllustrator in the Linux Gazette are missleading.
|
|
Killustrator isn't "tied to KDE" as you indicate, it runs perfectly fine
|
|
on any desktop. KIllustrator, however, uses KDE as application development
|
|
framework, which is something completely different.</font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>This
|
|
has nothing to do with "being KDE-aware", it's all about writing applications.
|
|
KDE is not just a desktop, it's a set of libraries and tools that makes
|
|
it possible to write applications. By asking programmers not to use
|
|
modern tools to develop their applications, you force them to re-invent
|
|
the wheel over and over again.In the best case this will provide us with
|
|
applications similar to xfig and tgif (which both cannot compete with modern
|
|
standards). In the worst case this leads to no applications at all.</font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>Come'on,
|
|
installing software on linux today means a few clicks in kpackage, that
|
|
can't be that hard ;-)</font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>Matthias
|
|
Ettrich <<a href="mailto:ettrich@kde.org">ettrich@kde.org</a>></font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1><b><font color="#993300">'Muse:</font></b>
|
|
End users don't distiguish between "application development framework"
|
|
and dependencies. It's just symantics. KIllustrator is tied
|
|
to KDE because you need the appropriate KDE libraries to run the program
|
|
and/or compile it. The same is true of the Gimp - it's tied to Gtk.
|
|
The difference is that Gtk has been available in most Linux distributions,
|
|
and for a number of other Unix platforms, for some time now (at least the
|
|
past year). KDE is just now becoming part of most Linux distributions,
|
|
which will make grabbing the occassional extra KDE package from the net
|
|
a less complex issue in the future.</font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1>This isn't to say KDE is
|
|
a problem to deal with, it's just not currently convenient to the end user.
|
|
Gnome applications have the same problem. But for users on non-Linux
|
|
platforms, for which neither Gnome or KDE are available, these applications
|
|
are of no use. It's your choice as a developer, of course.
|
|
I prefer to write for any Unix platform, or at least as many as I can reasonably
|
|
support.</font></font>
|
|
<p>
|
|
<hr SIZE=1 NOSHADE WIDTH="80%">
|
|
<br><u><font face="Arial,Helvetica">XFig</font></u>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>I read
|
|
in your LG article that you could not get xfig to export or print. Is your
|
|
problem perhaps that you have not got fig2dev installed? This program
|
|
is part of the transfig package (see the xfig docs).</font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>Yours,</font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>Jeroen
|
|
Nijhof</font></font></font>
|
|
<br><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1><a href="mailto:J.H.B.Nijhof@aston.ac.uk">J.H.B.Nijhof@aston.ac.uk</a></font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1><b><font color="#993300">'Muse:</font></b>
|
|
Looks like that could be the reason. I, indeed, do not have fig2dev
|
|
installed.</font></font>
|
|
<p>
|
|
<hr SIZE=1 NOSHADE WIDTH="80%">
|
|
<p><u><font face="Arial,Helvetica">Sketch</font></u>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>I've
|
|
just read the new issue of the Linux Gazette and your Graphics Muse column
|
|
and I was delighted to see that you investigated the vector drawing programs
|
|
available for Linux.</font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>As
|
|
the developer of Sketch, I was somewhat disappointed, as you can imagine,
|
|
when I read that you weren't able to install it. The points you raise are
|
|
perfectly valid, although most of the problems are caused by misleading
|
|
statements in PILs README, I think. I guess that everybody who is not very
|
|
experienced with building Python C-Extensions will have similar problems,
|
|
and I don't know how many people have given up installing Sketch because
|
|
of this.</font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>In
|
|
your column, you write:</font></font></font>
|
|
<blockquote><i><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1>Sketch requires
|
|
Python v1.5.1 or later, the Python Imaging Library, v1.0b1 and Tcl/TK,
|
|
version 8.0 or later. To build the Python Imaging Library (aka PIL)
|
|
you can't use the RPM version of Python - you have to build the python
|
|
distribution from source and install it. This is because you have
|
|
to build PIL under the "Extensions" directory of the Python 1.5 directories.</font></font></i></blockquote>
|
|
<font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>This is
|
|
not true, actually. The PIL README says that you should unpack the archive
|
|
in Python's Extensions directory, but you can in fact unpack it anywhere
|
|
you like (in your home directory for instance) and build it there.</font></font></font>
|
|
<blockquote><i><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1>Although I have
|
|
Python 1.5 installed on my stock RH 5.2 box, there is no Extensions directory.
|
|
Plus, if I just made the directory where 1.5 is installed (/usr/lib/python1.5),
|
|
I'd have to build the PIL as the root user. Not a good thing.
|
|
So I downloaded the Python 1.5 source, built it, then tried the PIL buid.
|
|
It didn't work - something about missing a config directory.</font></font></i></blockquote>
|
|
<font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>You don't
|
|
need the Python sources to build the PIL as long as you have a complete
|
|
installation of the Python interpreter and the C-header-files, libraries
|
|
and configuration files. RedHat has split Python into several packages.
|
|
The header files and configuration files are in the python-devel rpm, as
|
|
far as I can tell (I don't use RedHat, but I had a look at their ftp server),
|
|
so if you install that rpm you should be able to build PIL with these commands:</font></font></font>
|
|
<blockquote><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1>% tar xvzf Imaging-1.0b1.tar.gz</font></font>
|
|
<br><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1>% cd Imaging-1.0b1/libImaging/</font></font>
|
|
<br><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1>% ./configure</font></font>
|
|
<br><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1>% make</font></font>
|
|
<br><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1>% cd ..</font></font>
|
|
<br><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1>% make -f Makefile.pre.in
|
|
boot</font></font>
|
|
<br><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1>% make</font></font></blockquote>
|
|
<font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>and install
|
|
it under /usr/lib/python1.5/site-packages as described in the PIL README.
|
|
After that, installing Sketch itself should be simple, I hope :)</font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>All
|
|
in all, I have to thank you for the article. As a developer, it's difficult
|
|
to guess where user's may have problems and the information you provide
|
|
is exactly what I need to make Sketch easier to install.</font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>I really
|
|
hope that you give Sketch another try and perhaps write about it and the
|
|
other programs again in a future graphics muse column.</font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>Bernhard
|
|
Herzog <<a href="mailto:sketch@online.de">sketch@online.de</a>></font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1><b><font color="#993300">'Muse:</font></b>
|
|
Attention developers - this is <u>exactly</u> the way you should respond
|
|
to end user and press criticisms! I applaud Bernard for taking my
|
|
issues to heart and offering such useful feedback. I hope, for my
|
|
own projects, that I reply to criticisms' in the same professional and
|
|
meaningful manner.</font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1>Oh, and Bernard's feeback
|
|
was perfect. I managed to get things running pretty quick with his
|
|
help. Note that he is correct about the Red Hat RPMs - if you are
|
|
using the Red Hat 5.2 distribution you may not have automatically installed
|
|
the Python development package, which you need to build PIL. You'll
|
|
know this is the case if you try to run the Makefile.pre.in step (above)
|
|
and get a message about</font></font>
|
|
<blockquote><tt><font size=-1>No rule to make target `/usr/lib/python1.5/config/Makefile</font></tt></blockquote>
|
|
<font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1>That would be because the "config"
|
|
directory for Python only gets installed (using RPMs) with the <a href="http://rufus.w3.org/linux/RPM/redhat/5.2/i386/python-devel-1.5.1-5.i386.html">python-devel-1.5.1-5
|
|
RPM for i386 </a>package. Don't forget to also install the three
|
|
header files from PIL into the python include directories. The INSTALL
|
|
file for Sketch describes this simply enough. After getting the Python
|
|
development package and Python Imaging Library installed, the build for
|
|
sketch was very simple. Just folllow the steps in the README.
|
|
Sketch itself is easy to build. It's all the bits and pieces it requires
|
|
from Python that were a bit of a pain to get going.</font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1>One other thing: make
|
|
sure you build with the 0.6.0 version. I tried with an earlier 0.5.5
|
|
version and had some build incompatibilities with my Python 1.5.1 installation.
|
|
You can get around these easily enough, but its even easier if you just
|
|
grab the 0.6.0 (or later) source code.</font></font>
|
|
<center>
|
|
<p><img SRC="images/sketch.gif" VSPACE=10 height=424 width=583></center>
|
|
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1>Sketch's interface is fairly
|
|
simple to learn. Unlike TGIF or XFig, Sketch is more of an artists
|
|
tool, something like Adobe Illustrator (it even reads and writes Illustrator
|
|
files!). I wouldn't really put sketch in the same category as the
|
|
other two - they seem meant for different uses. Being more of an
|
|
artist (or at least a wanna-be artist), I really liked Sketch. Once
|
|
I managed to get it running.</font></font>
|
|
<p>
|
|
<hr SIZE=1 NOSHADE WIDTH="80%">
|
|
<p><u><font face="Arial,Helvetica">And just a little praise...</font></u>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>This
|
|
is a letter from a real Graphics Muse fan! You are doing a great
|
|
job with your column in the Linux Gazette, and all that monthly.
|
|
Congratulations!</font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1><font color="#993300">'Muse:</font>
|
|
Thanks!</font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>Sometimes,
|
|
I think of contributing more to the Linux community myself, but my daytime
|
|
job eats up most of my time/energy. How can you make such a neat
|
|
article every month? Where do you get your energy from? Kryptonite?
|
|
:-)</font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1><font color="#993300">'Muse:</font><font color="#000000">
|
|
No, but a lack of anything that remotely resembles a social life helps.
|
|
As for your contribution to the cause - you're making it now, by providing
|
|
feedback to me. Don't underestimate the importance such feedback
|
|
plays.</font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>Why
|
|
I'm really writing this letter...</font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>In
|
|
[last] month's Gazette you compare tgif and xfig. In brief:
|
|
Well done. Great job! I liked especially the sentence that
|
|
your preference towards tgif is _not_ mirrored in the numerical "test"-result.
|
|
If every software comparison/test were done so carefully, we would have
|
|
far fewer flame wars in the news groups.</font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1><font color="#CC0000">'Muse:
|
|
</font><font color="#000000">Maybe,
|
|
but human instinct is toward clarification from the point of view of the
|
|
reader. Which means argument is almost guaranteed at some point (at
|
|
least between relatively intellectually motivated individuals). But
|
|
I digress.</font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>As
|
|
I am a long-time (old-time?) user of both programs, I just want to add
|
|
some fine points to your careful judgment. Why the heck would you
|
|
want to use both? Well, once you are in the boat, you must row.</font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>Almost
|
|
all of the documents I produce are typeset with LaTeX. From time
|
|
to time I have to include simple drawings. Now, because TeX produces
|
|
such wonderful looking documents, the graphics have to match that.
|
|
This means all the text (e.g. labels, legend) in a graph must be typeset
|
|
with TeX. Using fonts from a different family does not look good.
|
|
The problem is that TeX's graphing capabilities (i.e. the picture-environment)
|
|
are very limited. What the user wants is the full power of Postscript.
|
|
That said, xfig and it's companion programs transfig, and fig2dev are a
|
|
blessing. They allow for exactly what I have been describing.</font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>The
|
|
typical data-flow looks like this:</font></font></font>
|
|
<p><tt> editor
|
|
TeX
|
|
dvips</tt>
|
|
<br><tt>|-------> doc.tex ---------------+----> doc.dvi ---+----> doc.ps</tt>
|
|
<br><tt>
|
|
^
|
|
^</tt>
|
|
<br><tt> xfig
|
|
fig2dev |
|
|
|</tt>
|
|
<br><tt>|-------> graph.fig ----+---> graph.tex
|
|
|</tt>
|
|
<br><tt>
|
|
|
|
|
|</tt>
|
|
<br><tt>
|
|
+---> graph.ps ----------->+</tt>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>The
|
|
dependencies between the files are automatically updated with a Makefile.
|
|
OK, now you know why I am stuck with xfig: it is the only program that
|
|
can separate the text-output (read: TeX) from the graphic-output (read:
|
|
Postscript).</font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>Enter:
|
|
Postscript files.</font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>Imagine
|
|
a colleague walking in and saying: "We should include one of these fancy
|
|
XYZ [insert program name yourself] outputs, you know that thing can produce
|
|
Postscript-files." Oh, oh -- this is bad news.</font></font></font>
|
|
<ol>
|
|
<li>
|
|
<font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>Sad but
|
|
true Postscript is not always Postscript. Some software has a very
|
|
particular idea of what makes up the Postscript-standard.</font></font></font></li>
|
|
|
|
<li>
|
|
<font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>Sure,
|
|
the program's output looks fancy, but it cannot be published without some
|
|
editing. How to edit a Postscript file? Lucky if you have Wolfgang
|
|
Glunz's pstoedit [currently version 3.03]. <i>pstoedit</i> translates
|
|
a ps-file with the help of ghostscript into a tgif-compatible file.
|
|
For a long time pstoedit's tgif-driver was the only one leading from un-editable
|
|
Postscript back to an editable format. Later it was the best driver
|
|
to do that. Today the xfig-driver does as well as the fig-driver.
|
|
But I started editing my ps-files a long time ago, and that is why I am
|
|
using tgif. Once upon a time I was the only tool to do what I needed.</font></font></font></li>
|
|
</ol>
|
|
<font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>You see,
|
|
the stories behind the usage of this tool or that tool can be quite convoluted.
|
|
The numbers of an "arbitrary" test may not tell you what you need.
|
|
Therefore, your xfig versus tgif comparison is a shining example of how
|
|
to write about performance, usability and all that.</font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>Christoph
|
|
L. Spiel</font></font></font>
|
|
<br><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font color="#CC0000"><font size=-1>cspiel@ccmr.cornell.edu</font></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1><font color="#993300">'Muse:</font>
|
|
All very good points! So often we measure tools objectively, using
|
|
what we think are absolute comparisons of speed or performance. But
|
|
we often fail to measure the seemingly intangible value of comfort that
|
|
lies within a tool for the individual user. Perhaps we should look
|
|
at software less as abstract pieces of pseudo-machinery and more as extensions
|
|
of our daily lives. We give life to our automobiles by referring
|
|
to them as "she". And if that automobile provides no comfort, then
|
|
it has limited value to the owner. Comfort, it seems, should be an
|
|
intrinsic part of our measurements of a software tool's usefulness to the
|
|
individual.</font></font>
|
|
<br>
|
|
<hr SIZE=3 NOSHADE WIDTH="100%">
|
|
<br><a NAME="A Little Eye-Candy, Please (continued)"></a><b><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=+1>A
|
|
Little Eye Candy, Please (continued)</font></font></b>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1>In my fvwm-menu file I've
|
|
added the following entries to run xscreensaver:</font></font>
|
|
<p><tt><font size=-1>AddToMenu XScreensaver "Screen Saver"
|
|
Title</font></tt>
|
|
<br><tt><font size=-1>+ "Matrix"
|
|
Function ScreenSaverMatrix</font></tt>
|
|
<br><tt><font size=-1>+ "XSaver On"
|
|
Function ScreenSaverOn</font></tt>
|
|
<br><tt><font size=-1>+ "XSaver Off"
|
|
Function ScreenSaverOff</font></tt><tt><font size=-1></font></tt>
|
|
<p><tt><font size=-1>AddToFunc ScreenSaverMatrix</font></tt>
|
|
<br><tt><font size=-1>+ "I" Exec
|
|
exec xscreensaver -no-splash &</font></tt>
|
|
<br><tt><font size=-1>+ "I" Exec
|
|
exec xscreensaver-command -select 1&</font></tt>
|
|
<p><tt><font size=-1>AddToFunc ScreenSaverOn</font></tt>
|
|
<br><tt><font size=-1>+ "I" Exec
|
|
exec xscreensaver -no-splash &</font></tt><tt><font size=-1></font></tt>
|
|
<p><tt><font size=-1>AddToFunc ScreenSaverOff</font></tt>
|
|
<br><tt><font size=-1>+ "I" Exec
|
|
exec xscreensaver-command -exit&</font></tt>
|
|
<br><tt><font size=-1>+ "I" Exec
|
|
exec xset s on</font></tt><tt><font size=-1></font></tt>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1>The first entry, Matrix,
|
|
will run only the xmatrix screensaver immediately and leave it running.
|
|
The second entry just starts the screensaver using the first entry in my
|
|
programs list in $HOME/.xscreensaver and allows it to cycle through the
|
|
list. This also starts only when the configured inactivity period
|
|
has expired. The last entry shuts xscreensaver off and returns my
|
|
X servers screen blanker back on.</font></font><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1>The three programs that come
|
|
with xscreensaver - the xscreensaver daemon, xscreensaver-demo and xscreensaver-command
|
|
- also include extensive man pages in HTML format. It seems
|
|
a bit odd that there are som many options for something as simple as a
|
|
screensaver, but they are all useful options. Be sure to read through
|
|
the documentation before trying to set up running the screensaver from
|
|
your window manager as I have done in the examples above.</font></font><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1>Some of the other intersting
|
|
hacks I have configured are:</font></font>
|
|
<center><img SRC="images/decayscreen.jpg" VSPACE=10 height=432 width=576>
|
|
<br><b><font face="Arial,Helvetica">Decay Screen</font></b>
|
|
<p><img SRC="images/spotlight.jpg" VSPACE=10 height=176 width=252>
|
|
<br><b><font face="Arial,Helvetica">Spotlight</font></b><br CLEAR=BOTH>
|
|
<BR>
|
|
<br><img SRC="images/radar.jpg" VSPACE=10 height=432 width=576>
|
|
<br><b><font face="Arial,Helvetica">Radar</font></b></center>
|
|
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1>It's just a fun thing to
|
|
play with, not much else really. If you dig into the code for some
|
|
of these hacks (and xscreensaver itself), however, you might just learn
|
|
quite a bit about how low level graphics work under X.</font></font><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1></font></font>
|
|
<p><font face="Arial,Helvetica"><font size=-1>Enjoy!</font></font>
|
|
<br>
|
|
<table WIDTH="100%" >
|
|
<tr>
|
|
<td VALIGN=TOP COLSPAN="4" BGCOLOR="#000000" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><img SRC="images/cleardot.gif" ALT="indent" align=LEFT></td>
|
|
</tr>
|
|
</table>
|
|
|
|
<table WIDTH="100%" >
|
|
<tr>
|
|
<td ALIGN=RIGHT><font size=-2>© 1998 by <a href="mailto:mjhammel@graphics-muse.org">Michael
|
|
J. Hammel</a></font></td>
|
|
</tr>
|
|
</table>
|
|
|
|
</body>
|
|
</html>
|