Re: [ft-devel] Porting to D

[Steve Hartwell]

on 6/3/2005 6:36 PM Trevor Parscal wrote:

> I am porting the very annoyingly complex FreeType headers to the D 
> programming language

You're off to a bad start here.  How much chance do you have of getting 
someone to help you now?

> Nowhere in the FreeType headers or source was there any actual 
> definition of these types, only refrences to to them to typedef others.
>
> FT_Incremental
> FT_Size_Internal
> FT_Raster
> FT_ClassRec

These types have actual definitions, except for the last one, which is 
marked "experimental" and not ready for use.  As the comments in the 
headers all explain (how could you have missed those?) the others are 
pointers to incomplete structs which must be defined by the user.  And 
you missed at least one more--see my post "Re: [ft-devel] does the face 
cache really work ?" of yesterday for an example and an explanation why 
these incomplete structs are useful.

> My next question is if there is any advice that anyone could give me 
> on porting these headers. Maybe there is a wealth of knowledge out 
> there that someone who ported them to another language before could 
> pour out to me.

I would suggest that if you intend to port C to D, that you first learn 
C well enough to understand what incomplete structure definitions are.  
And whatever else you need.

> Despite my dissapointment with the sheer complexity of the header 
> files, I do love the quality of the rendering, so don't take my 
> criticism as an insult. I imagine everyone can see the need for 
> simplification, or maybe that's just my view.. ?

No insult is possible, since your criticism is based only on your 
frustration and annoyance of not knowing enough about the C language, 
and has nothing to do with FreeType.

> Well, I hope soemone can help me figure this out. Great project, much 
> apprication for the hard work I know it probably took to make FreeType.

"Probably" ?

The FreeType headers, and the sources which implement them, are in my 
opinion as simple as they can be in order to achieve the quality, 
portability, and efficiency that we now all enjoy.

And fortunately, no simpler.

Steve Hartwell
http://stevehartwell.home.comcast.net/proj/fontinspector