Re: [Gnome-print] Re: [Gimp-print-devel] An introduction to gnome-print(fwd)

[Lauris Kaplinski <lauris kaplinski com>]

On Tue, 6 Jun 2000, Ben Woodard wrote:

> >    Date: Tue, 6 Jun 2000 00:47:06 +0200 (CEST)
> >    From: Lauris Kaplinski <lauris@kaplinski.com>
> > 
> >    > What you really should do is discuss any perceived shortcomings of
> >    > PostScript with Adobe.
> > 
> >    Yes. But we should not try to convince Adobe improving PostScript,
> >    but instead do that ourselves.  It time to take standard away from
> >    the hands of evil corporation :)
> > 
> > I've heard of using a sledgehammer to kill a fly; I've never heard of
> > using a flyswatter to kill an elephant.
> > 
> > I'm sorry, but this just about takes the cake for sheer nonsense.
> > Adobe may control the PostScript standard, but it is very well
> > specified, it's under active development, and Adobe's doing a good job
> > with it.  Exactly how do you propose to "take the standard away" from
> > Adobe?
> > 
> 
> The thing about PS is that the math behind it is quite solid and there
> is an amazing amount of accumulated wisdom embedded in it. A huge
> number of people with extremely different needs have been pounding on
> it for years now.

Please note, that I worked more closely with PS about 5 years ago.

1. General language (modified forth?) part of PS is excellent
2. Graphic part is moderate
3. Fonts suck badly :(

AFAIK there is still no way to acess underlying rendered buffer in PS, nor
ability to render temporary buffers (a la OpenGL). No way to compile
procedures - only bind, which is poor solution. Even worse - no graphic
operator does not have to do anything trackable, before showpage. Probably
DPS has addressed some of these issues.

Adding bezier planes to OpenGL would result in a bit better API, IMHO.

Lauris