JPG files and .RAR support in BYOND Discussion

ID:259749
 
May 14 2004, 1:41 pm
First, I think JPG files should be supported as they are smaller then BMP's and would make games lag less with images.

Second, .RAR is just like winzip but has a better compressor. www.winrar.com Try it :-) People with winrar can also open .zip packages and many more!
#1 May 14 2004, 2:44 pm
Ultimate End wrote:
First, I think JPG files should be supported as they are smaller then BMP's and would make games lag less with images.

PNG files are compressed images which are also much smaller than BMPs, which are supported already, and which (unlike JPEGs) aren't lossy -- i.e., when compressed, they look just like they do when uncompressed.

I'm not saying that JPEGs wouldn't be a good thing to have, but PNGs are an excellent format which you should check out.


Second, .RAR is just like winzip but has a better compressor. www.winrar.com Try it :-) People with winrar can also open .zip packages and many more!

Yes, but what does that have to do with BYOND? BYOND uses a ZIP library. It doesn't use WinZip for anything other than creating self-extracting executables for BYOND updates and downloads, which has no impact on the software.
#2 May 14 2004, 3:16 pm
In response to Spuzzum (#1)
No impcat? but there is! Us 56k modems would rather download 20 KBs instead of 1 MB!!! X_X It kills... I didnt know PNG files were supported >.>
#3 May 14 2004, 3:30 pm
In response to Ultimate End (#2)
Ultimate End wrote:
No impcat? but there is! Us 56k modems would rather download 20 KBs instead of 1 MB!!! X_X It kills... I didnt know PNG files were supported >.>

Nope, there still wouldn't be much of an impact. People would still continue to upload ZIPs, and only a select few would use RARs; besides, the savings between RAR and ZIP is less than 10% in most cases.
#4 May 14 2004, 4:38 pm
In response to Spuzzum (#3)
Well, sometime in the future I think .RAR support would be nice. When ever the creators get bored. lol
#5 May 14 2004, 8:59 pm
In response to Spuzzum (#3)
Yeah, I believe the difference is like a 30%-35% more than a zip...and in most cases like you said, the smaller file sizes, like say 1 mb of stuff, would only be compressed to like 800k, at the most from my short experience with rar and zip's.
#6 May 15 2004, 3:15 am
In response to Spuzzum (#3)
Unless the Package Files option made RAR files (with perhaps an option to use ZIP files instead). The savings wouldn't be huge, but they'd add up.

If it's reasonably easy to do, I say go for it; I'm not sure what is out there in the way of free RAR libraries with non-restrictive licences, though. And it's certainly not on the top of my wishlist. =)

Just did a quick search, and found this: http://www.unrarlib.org/ It only does decompression, though. Seems you have to contact the author of the RAR format if you want your program to be able to compress to RAR, which probably means paying him. Oh well, scratch that idea.
#7 May 15 2004, 3:32 am
In response to Crispy (#6)
i think the only problem in implementing jpg support is licensing. png support might eliminate that problem though.
#8 May 15 2004, 3:33 am
In response to digitalmouse (#7)
Um, digi... we have PNG support already. =)
#9 May 15 2004, 8:53 am
In response to Crispy (#8)
Crispy wrote:
Um, digi... we have PNG support already. =)

um... i knew that! just testing you! :p
#10 May 15 2004, 10:59 am
I think they use PNG over anything else because of the fact that GIF and JPG images are copyrighted, while PNG isn't. Unisys/CompuServe Incorporated owns the copyright to the GIF image, and I forget who owns copyright to the JPG image. Nobody owns a patent on PNG, so anyone can use it freely, especially since according to both copyrights on GIF and JPG, that anyone who programs software that uses the image formats has to purchase a license.
#11 May 15 2004, 12:10 pm
In response to Enigmaster2002 (#10)
Enigmaster2002 wrote:
I think they use PNG over anything else because of the fact that GIF and JPG images are copyrighted, while PNG isn't. Unisys/CompuServe Incorporated owns the copyright to the GIF image, and I forget who owns copyright to the JPG image. Nobody owns a patent on PNG, so anyone can use it freely, especially since according to both copyrights on GIF and JPG, that anyone who programs software that uses the image formats has to purchase a license.

Patent. Not copyright. Patent. They're two totally different things.
I believe that JPGs are freely available for use, too.
#12 May 16 2004, 2:21 am
In response to Jon88 (#11)
Jon88 wrote:
I believe that JPGs are freely available for use, too.

According to a quick Google search, you're pretty much right.

Here's what I found out: A company called Forgent is attempting to enforce royalties on people who make software that can *create* JPEGs, based on the fact that they recently acquired Compression Labs (which previously held the patent on JPEGs). However, that's only for creating JPEGs, not reading them; making programs that read them appears to be unrestricted. Besides, they're not having much luck in their attempted enforcement. Heh, heh.

So the legalities are fine. I'm not too sure of the usefulness of such a feature in most games; I can see it being good for title screens, but not much else. It's far too lossy for most game graphics.

So, like the RAR format suggestion; I'm all for new features, but this one is of a rather lower priority than some of the others. =)