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To: Scott Wagner <wagner@itek.com>
cc: "Richard J. Kinch" <kinch@holonet.net>, tiff@sgi.com
Subject: Re: Windows WIN32 DIB DLL available 
Reply-To: Sam Leffler <sam@relay.engr.SGI.COM>
In-reply-to: Your message of "Tue, 27 May 1997 08:18:43 EDT."
             <9705271211.AB18244@itek.com> 
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Date: Fri, 30 May 1997 11:35:40 -0700
From: Sam Leffler <sam@melange.engr.sgi.com>
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    To:  "Richard J. Kinch" <kinch@holonet.net>
    Subject:  Re: Windows WIN32 DIB DLL available
    Cc:  tiff@sgi.com
    Date: Tue, 27 May 1997 08:18:43 EDT
    From:  Scott Wagner <wagner@itek.com>

    Hello Richard,
    At 04:42 PM 5/23/97 -0400, you wrote:
    >I have developed a WIN32 DLL that returns a Windows DIB 
(device-independent
    >bitmap object) given a TIFF file, based on libtiff.  I would like to hear 
from
    >those who would like to help test and use such a component.
    >...
    >If this is something you could use and are willing to help test (that is, 
you
    >write WIN32 applications that use DIB's), send me your e-mail address and 
I
    >will reply with a UUencoded ZIP file, containing the DLL, sample code, and
    >documentation.  Whether the finished product will be free and reflected 
into
    >Sam's master libtiff has not yet been decided, but all testers will 
receive a
    >free, final copy.
    >
    
    I agree that inclusion of DIB features in Libtiff is essential to complete
    its Win32 port.  Early Libtiff, which was targeted for SGI Unix boxes,
    supported tiff-to-native bitmap operations, but this trend (regrettably)
    died in ports to other systems.  I have considered a TIFF-to-DIB addition 
to
    Libtiff, but have not pursued this beyond a little defeatured version for 
my
    own use.  So, my opinion is that this and other tiff-to-native operations
    would (or should) be welcome additions to Libtiff.
    
FYI, libtiff was originally written on Sun systems; I never saw an SGI
machine until many years after the software existed.

In general I've considered tiff-to-anything conversion support to be outside
the scope of what I distribute.  In fact I've frequently considered dumping
the "to-tiff" conversion apps I provide since they're frequently of little
use in the real world.  I keep the existing programs around only because I
sometimes use them and because they serve as examples of using the library.

If there are Win32-specific API calls that make sense then I suggest adding
them to the tif_win32.c code.  Otherwise I'd recommend doing what you can
outside the scope of the library and contributing it in a form that's easy
to pickup w/ the library.  I provide a contrib area in the distribution for
such stuff.

       Sam


