From owner-freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Tue Feb 5 15:33:51 2008 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 5E71C16A419 for ; Tue, 5 Feb 2008 15:33:51 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from des@des.no) Received: from tim.des.no (tim.des.no [194.63.250.121]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 1889013C457 for ; Tue, 5 Feb 2008 15:33:51 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from des@des.no) Received: from tim.des.no (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by spam.des.no (Postfix) with ESMTP id B15602085; Tue, 5 Feb 2008 16:33:42 +0100 (CET) X-Spam-Tests: AWL X-Spam-Learn: disabled X-Spam-Score: -0.3/3.0 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.2.3 (2007-08-08) on tim.des.no Received: from ds4.des.no (des.no [80.203.243.180]) by smtp.des.no (Postfix) with ESMTP id 384052084; Tue, 5 Feb 2008 16:33:42 +0100 (CET) Received: by ds4.des.no (Postfix, from userid 1001) id 1A60C844B3; Tue, 5 Feb 2008 16:33:42 +0100 (CET) From: =?utf-8?Q?Dag-Erling_Sm=C3=B8rgrav?= To: Oliver Fromme References: <200802051332.m15DW2WU020689@lurza.secnetix.de> <86zlufwi4o.fsf@ds4.des.no> Date: Tue, 05 Feb 2008 16:33:42 +0100 In-Reply-To: <86zlufwi4o.fsf@ds4.des.no> ("Dag-Erling =?utf-8?Q?Sm=C3=B8rg?= =?utf-8?Q?rav=22's?= message of "Tue\, 05 Feb 2008 16\:13\:59 +0100") Message-ID: <86myqfwh7t.fsf@ds4.des.no> User-Agent: Gnus/5.110006 (No Gnus v0.6) Emacs/22.1 (berkeley-unix) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Cc: freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: why is it called /boot/beastie.4th ? X-BeenThere: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Non technical items related to the community List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Tue, 05 Feb 2008 15:33:51 -0000 Dag-Erling Sm=C3=B8rgrav writes: > The kernel splash code supports both BMP (courtesy of Mike Smith, IIRC) > and PCX (courtesy of yours truly). I've written a number of PCX decoders over the years, BTW, and I remember that I once wrote a codec for a stripped-down version which supported only single-plane 8-bit color. It turns out that for that specific case, which was the most common at the time, you could achieve considerably better compression by dropping the padding at the end of each scan line, and allowing runs to cross from the end of one scan line to the beginning of the next (with due consideration given to not exceeding the width of the run length counter). Of course, RLE pales in comparison with most other lossless algorithms, even contemporary ones such as the LZ family. Considering that an LZ codec can be implemented with a fairly small amount of code and requires a fairly small amount of memory for the dictionary, and how poorly RLE performs with anything more complex than line drawings, it is surprising that ZSoft even considered it, much less used it in their finished product. DES --=20 Dag-Erling Sm=C3=B8rgrav - des@des.no