
Revision history for Graphics-Framebuffer

1.00    2004
        First version, released privately only, as part of a Perl
		media player project called "SuperSparky".

4.02    Dec 29, 2013
        Public CPAN release.  This is considerably more advanced
		than the one distributed as part of the media player.

4.03    March 20, 2014
        Minor changes to the CPAN package

4.05    April 14, 2014
        Documentation updates.  POD section revamped.

4.06    July 19, 2014
        Added better testing
        
        Added framebuffer emulation mode for test running on systems
        without a hardware framebuffer.  It draws to a 640x480x32
        virtual screen in memory.  You can dump this screen to a file.
        
4.07    July 23, 2014
        Fixed calculation error in string size allocation for emulation
        mode.
        
        Fixed fill 'flood' typo.
        
        Fixed pixel class documentation.  It was incorrect.

        Added more tests for most used classes.

4.08    July 25, 2014
        Added additional information to the documentation for the new
        emulation mode.  No actual code changes made.

4.09    November 26, 2014
        Added more FBIOCTL flags to make ready for future hardware
        accellerated updates.  No promises here, but heck, this
        entire module was an exercise in "can it be done in Perl?"
        
        Also fixed a code comment that was mislabeled.

4.10    May 10, 2015
        Added the ability to customize the framebuffer file path.
        Thanks Markus Maier.
        
        Added aliases to "set_mode"

        Some minor documentation fixes.

4.11    July 03, 2015
        Numerous changes.

        Changed ttf_print box_mode to return everything needed to call itself
        again.

        Added a 'COLOR_ORDER' setting to the "new" parameters.  1=RGB and 0=BGR.
        The default is BGR.

        Added more comments to the code

        Added 'reset' as an alias to 'attributes_reset'.  Just for people with
        different tastes.

        Hardened the code further against undefined values.

        Added more documentation

        Tested on Raspberry PI2, and works great!  Odroid XU3, not so much...

        Circle/ellipse clipping weirdness remains.  I should have that addressed
        in the next release.

4.12    July 05, 2015
        Minor POD fix

        There was a POD error that caused it to fail testing, although it would
        have worked fine if installed.

        No new functionality in this release, just that one issue fixed.

4.13    July 06, 2015
        Changed the tests to only test against a memory buffer.

        The tests get screwed up by the Test::Harness' output (which can't be
        squelched apparently).  So instead of testing on the real framebuffer,
        I force the tests on a pseudo memory buffer.

        I believe I have fixed the clipping issues, especially the ones with
        filled ellipses and circles.  It was related to blit_write.

        There are some minor optimizations, although likely not obvious.

4.14    July 07, 2015
        Fixed borked plot test.  Functionality of the module is fine.  The test
        was broken.

4.15    July 07, 2015
        Optimizations!

        I have optimized the draw_arc routine, and in the process made it
        properly work with XOR mode as well.  It only draws what it hasn't
        drawn before.  Which makes it quite faster (although still not a speed
        demon).

4.16    July 14, 2015
        Bug fixes

        Fill is now fixed.  This sucker still uses stack memory like it's going
        out of style.  You have been warned.

        Filled polygons now, as long as they aren't overly complicated, and the
        borders do not cross.  It uses a history buffer when drawing and then
        uses it to draw a series of horizontal lines to "fill" the polygon. This
        fill is very fast as a result.

        'line' added for an alternate way of drawing a line.  It's essentially
        a combination of plot > drawto under the hood.

        Warnings have been completely turned off.  We don't want warnings to
        mess up your pretty graphics.  Crashable code is in an eval, so who
        cares?  Generally warnings begin happening when Perl has done a
        variable garbage collection, and the memory mapping to the framebuffer
        is borked.  Fortunately, the module now recovers from this and remaps
        it.

        Clipping is quicker and more robust.

        Documentation has been updated / fixed where appropriate.

4.17    July 14, 2015
        Fixed bugs as a result of some typos.  Sorry about that.
        This affected the draw_arc and ellipse routines.
        
        Made poly arcs draw with lines instead of single pixels.  That fills in
        the errors left by high granularity.
        
        Added the constants 'ARC', 'PIE', and 'POLY_ARC' to make drawing arcs
        easier to code.

4.18    July 14, 2015
        Added new arc drawing methods.  See the POD docs (man) for details.

4.19    July 16, 2015
        Fixed the POD errors on test.  I could swear I tested that.  Oh well.

4.20    July 16, 2015
        Removed the harmless leftover SCREEN2 code.  Since that variable no
        longer existed, the code skips by it.

4.21    July 16, 2015
        Ugh, I left "Data::Dumper::Simple" in the previous version.  Build
        was borking on machines without it.  Sorry folks.

        I try to leave out all debugging code to keep the module as fast as
        possible, but I missed this one.

4.22    July 21, 2015
        I added a new mode to the framebuffer engine.  Typically the module
        uses a memory mapped method to draw to the framebuffer.  It's fast,
        but on some systems, this may be unstable.  In such cases, you have
        the option of telling the drawing engine to use a file handle mode
        instead.  File handle mode is a little slower, so use this mode
        only if necessary.  See the manual for specifics.

4.23    July 21, 2015
        Modified the testing to stop failing too easy.  It's really not
        catestrophic if a test fails.  Testing kind of interferes with
        the output anyway.

        Consolided the tests into one single "primitives" test.

        ARM Mali GPUs now work.  I found the problem was the framebuffer
        driver was returning some bogus data, and was throwing off the
        calculations for drawing.  Which caused crazy numbers to be
        sent to the mmap call, and thus fail.  Now an override can be
        sent when initializing the module to fix this.  Yes, this means
        that this module now works on the Odroid XU3!

        The scripts in the "examples" directory can be put into MALI mode
        by simply passing "mali" on the command line.

        I added a boxfill for hardware accelerated cards.  It's automatic
        when called by box/rbox in the API.  It only works with filled
        boxes in normal and XOR mode.

        If hardware accelerated filled boxes aren't working, then you
        can disable them by setting (assume $fb is your object variable)
        $fb->{'accel_flags'} = 0

        Oh, and blitcopy is hardware accelerated in normal mode only as
        well, if your video card supports it.

4.24    July 23, 2015
        Vertical Gradents for boxes, ellipses, circles, and polygons
        added.  See the documentation for details.  See the "examples"
        directory for... well... examples.
        
        Polygon fills fixed.  No more gaps.  Go easy on the complex
        filled polygons though.  Sometimes you get better results by
        making a complex filled polygon out of smaller simple ones.

        Updated the examples with up-to-date tests.

        Added "UNMASK_MODE" to the documentation.  Sorry about not having it
        in there in the first place.  I also added the shortcut method
        "unmask_mode".

        Added "angle_line" method for drawing lines at specific angles.

5.00    July 31, 2015
        Major version update.

        So many things have been added and optimized, that it warrants a full
        version number upgrade.

        'replace_color' is VERY fast if clipping is reset (off)

        'pie_arc' has been changed.  It uses the same fill routine that the
        polygon fill uses.  Thus it draws a lot faster with no more gaps.
        Granularity is not as important.  The value of 0.01 for granularity
        should work for most uses (unless you have a 4K screen).

        'fill' Is a lot faster, and uses considerably less memory now.  I
        knew I'd get it down.

        New 'monochrome' method that takes any image data and makes it
        greyscale.  Using it with the blit methods should be handy.

        TrueType font rendering is improved.  It has a default font setting,
        which you can change when you instantiate the framebuffer.  It also
        takes a new parameter 'wscale' to scale the width of the text.  It
        takes decimal values between 1 (inclusive) to 0 (exclusive).  1
        is normal, and smaller values squeeze the text.

        Color conversions are a bit better for 16 bit framebuffers.

        Added 'cubic_bezier' curves!  Yes, you can be a spline master now.

        More friendlier named methods that are aliases to others.

        Due to the extra features, two more prerequisite modules are
        required.
        
        On that note, I removed the need for Switch.pm. It turns out it's
        flakey and starts to give bizarre errors, not to mention I realized
        it has a performance penalty. So yes, this module is a little bit
        faster now as a result.

        Boxes can have rounded corners in frame, filled, and gradient
        filled modes, if you desire.  Just add the parameter 'radius'
        to the method call.

        Polygons with rounded corners are not ready.  I am still having
        trouble with them, but they will be added eventually.

        This new version comes with a splash screen, which can be turned off.

        The scripts in the 'examples' directory have been updated to reflect
        the new additions.  They should be very helpful in getting you
        started.

        Please read the manual for info on the new additions.

5.01    August 03, 2015
        Fixed colorspace handling.  Whether your video card is RGB or BGR (or
        anything else), the module handles it fine.  Also, 32, 24, and 16 bit
        color modes are fully supported now.  Note, 16 bit is a bit slower due
        to the need for bit shifting.  So I recommend 32 bit.

        Color replace (replace_color) is now fixed, and quite a bit faster.
        Super-fast if you do it without clipping (clip_reset).

        More code optimizations have been added for speed.

        cls/screen_clear have been changed a bit to be more effective when
        clipping is off.  You can also enable/disable the console cursor if
        you pass 'ON' or 'OFF' to them.

        Splash screen contains info on the video card, and if hardware
        acceleration is used.  It also indicates which color order RGB are
        (look at the 'GFB' in the upper left circle, they are colored
        according your video card's order).

5.02    August 03, 2015
        Discontinued "cubic_bezier' and replaced it with 'bezier'.  It was so
        young, but this needed to be done.  It will still work, but I don't
        suggest continuing to use it.  It's now just an alias to 'bezier'.

        New 'bezier' method can create complex multi-point curves and shapes.
        If a closed shape, it can be filled too.

        Module prerequisites changed.

        Optimized rounded corner box drawing.

5.03    August 05, 2015
        Improved the IOCTL handling.  A lot of work there.  Still can't figure
        out why Mali and Nouveau are not giving the needed information to
        properly draw.  The size of the framebuffer is improperly reported by
        the Mali driver, and the size of a line is improperly reported by the
        Nouveau driver.  It seems Nouveau requires an additional 192 bytes per
        line.,, weird.

        So, to compensate for weirdness, I added another option to the 'new'
        method, LINE_PADDING.  With this one and MALI, I hope I have the quirks
        covered.

        Optimized the rounded box algorithm for solid fills a bit more.

        Changed the splash screen a bit.

        Changed the examoples scripts to fall in line with the changes.

5.04    August 06, 2015
        Optimized circles and boxes with rounded corners... by a lot.

5.05    August 08, 2015
        Fixed load_image, and added color remapping as well.

5.06    August 08, 2015
        Documentation for 'load_image' was incorrect.  'load_image' returns
        a structure containing the image for display with 'blit_write'.

5.07    August 08, 2015
        Fixed the 32/24/16 bit conversions for image loading.


5.08    August 08, 2015
        Ugh, I left some debug code in one of the examples scripts.

5.09    August 09, 2015

        Updated the documentation.

        Updates to set_color and related methods
        
5.10    August 09, 2015
        Fixed a bug in xoffset calculations.

5.11    August 10, 2015
        Fixed a POD error

5.12    August 11, 2015
        Improved color replace.  It's a lot faster for clipped mode.

        Modified the test scripts to dynamically adjust to the resolution of
        the device.  This way the tests look fine on all devices, even tiny
        96x64 OLED devices.

        I was handling hardware acceleration incorrectly, which is why it
        didn't work (duh).  Right now it's just turned off.  It requires
        Inline C code, and I am not prepared for that yet.

5.13    August 11, 2015
        More fixes to line drawing and blitting routines.

        Made test scripts completely resolution independent.  They should
        display sane graphics for even the smallest disoplays.

5.14    August 12, 2015
        Hardened memory mapping.

        If mmap fails more than twice, it now just switches to file handle mode.
        Apparently when mmap fails, in some environments, the file handle
        disappears as well.  Attempts are also made to recover the file handle
        too.

        Tests now check to see if run in X-Windows.  Naughty naughty those of
        you not reading the instructions!  I don't like receiving CPAN reporter
        errors when the error is not reading the instructions (wink wink).

5.15    August 12, 2015
        Added a real test pattern to image tests

5.16    August 13, 2015
        Fixed color mapping for ttf_print

5.17    August 13, 2015
        Removed MALI and LINE_PADDING
        
        Byte aligning helped figure out the driver paramenter structures.

5.18    August 13, 2015
        Moved the images into their own directory

        Modified the scripts to work with the images.

5.19    August 13, 2015
        Replaced some for[each] loops with map for just that slight boost
        of speed.  Every optimization helps.

5.20    August 14, 2015
        Fixed the color mapping for the TrueType font rendering.  This was
        most obvious in 16 bit modes.  However, because of the complexities
        in this process, text rendering for 16 bit modes is slower, as it
        has to convert the 24 bit output of Imager into a 16 bit image to
        then blit to the screen.  I will see if there are optimizations I can
        do for this in the future.  Meanwhile it works.

        Rounded box rendering has been fixed.  It was showing an error in the
        right side of the boxes mostly.  This is no longer an issue.

        Fixed the splash screen to show something coherrant on very low
        resolution displays, like adafruit displays for example (96x64x16).

        I have also forced buffer flushes on the screen filehandle.  It was
        buffering the drawing, which was leaving artifacts and driving me
        crazy.  Fortunately, this doesn't affect speed, as I don't tell it to
        flush the buffer until after the entire primitive is drawn.

5.21    August 14, 2015
        Modified clear_screen a bit.

        Made changes to the test and examples scripts.

5.22    August 14, 2015
        I somehow reintroduced some clipping errors I had previously fixed.
        Well, those are fixed once again.

5.23    August 16, 2015
        I fixed one last clipping bug in horizontal line drawing and the top
        of the screen.

5.24    August 17, 2015
        Mostly documentation updates.

        'threadtest.pl' was no longer showing what each thread was doing.  It
        must have been related to the buffering fixes for the graphics.  Doing
        a flush on STDOUT seems to hae fixed it.

5.25    August 18, 2015
        Added assign colorspace ability to emulation mode.  No longer is it
        just RGB.  You can define it yourself.

5.26    August 19, 2015
        Fixed image load routine.

5.27    August 19, 2015
        Fixed POD errors

5.28    August 20, 2015
        The polygon fill has been cpompletely rewritten.  It has one minor
        requirement though, that all polygons need to be drawn with their
        points in a clockwise direction.  Keep that in mind and filled
        polygons will look great.

5.29    August 20, 2015
        Documentation changes

        Improved a couple of the example scripts

5.30    August 21, 2015
        'image_load' now allows you Hto define the type of scaling to use, if
        the image is to e scaled.

        A few minor changes to the example scripts.

5.31    August 25, 2015
        Re-wrote the algorithm that retrieves the framebuffer ioctl structures
        Different CPU types really throw this off, and attempting to use c2ph
        shows that c2ph is broken.  Hopefully this algorithm works.

        Included further install documentation, as it seems installing Imager
        from CPAN can result in a useless Imager if the necessary libraries aren't
        present ahead of time.

5.32    August 25, 2015
        Fixed some typos

5.33    August 26, 2015
        Improved the IOCTL detection code further.  It just goes to fbset if it
        gets confused.

        Added further documentation on installation and troubleshooting.

        Added a disagnostics script call "dump.pl" in the "examples" directory.
        I may ask you to send me the output of this, if you contact me for help.

5.34    August 26, 2015
        Horizontal gradients are now allowed (in addition to the vertical).  See
        the documentation for details.  Surprisingly, this draws faster on some
        primitives.

5.35    August 28, 2015
        Improved cursor show/hide in clear_screen/cls.

        Added more tests to primitives.pl.  Made slideshow.pl show on all
        framebuffer devices on the system.
