From: Thomas Martitz <thomas.martitz_at_student.htw-berlin.de>
Date: Thu, 11 Feb 2010 05:42:11 +0100

On 10.02.2010 23:35, Jonathan Gordon wrote:
> OK, this was talked about a bit in IRC today but I want to get more of
> an answer (the topic came to a halt :p )
>
> I think everyone agrees that having a single buffer to hold as many
> fonts as the user wants (up to a reasonable number) is the best way to
> go, but this has been the case for as long as I can remember and
> nothing has happened.
>
> I now have a patch which works and is almost finished, but it uses
> separate buffers for each font (coming from the skin buffer, not new
> buffers) which I feel is a good enough solution until someone comes
> along and does the work to make it all into one buffer.
>
> So here is the question. Is there enough opposition to going about it
> this way (separate buffers for each font) that someone will put up
> their hand and do the work so its done properly? Or are we happy to
> have this "good enough" solution for the time being?
>
> This "good enough" version by the way is in no way hacky or anything,
> its just not the best solution. (FS#10984 by the way)
>
> Jonathan
>

To be honest, I'm not the greatest fan of this implementation, although
it's way better than the original one (things like the skin buffer
didn't exist back then).

As noted, a single buffer would perform best. But let's be serious,
nobody is going to look at this in a reasonable time. Multifont is a
much-asked feature (in fact, it's almost required on targets with a
remote), even asked by devs which dislike JdGordon's way (like me and
amiconn). But I would really love to see it in instead of waiting for
the correct way another 3 years.

We must remind that - if it happens that the skin buffer is resonably
resizable (by automatically adjusting and/or user setting - I said I
would like to have a look at the former) this way is good enough, as it
doesn't have a penalty for the ones that don't use it (the originial
patch had this).

Ultimatively, I think it should go in. BUT, I would like to see a way
for plugins to make use of it. "Bad" Multifont for themes only - I'm not
sure if that's worth it. (IMO yes, because I like theming, but I can
imagine there're a plenty of voices against).

Best regards.
Received on 2010-02-11