On Thu, 1 Jun 2000 23:25:00 +0200, "Mösl Roland" <fou### [at] pegeorg>
wrote:

>I have found Perl subroutines to
>find out height and width of GIF and JPG.
>
>As soon as I find such a subroutine
>also for PNG, I change all my web sites.

Try the PerlMagick modules from ImageMagick.


Peter Popov ICQ : 15002700
Personal e-mail : pet### [at] usanet
TAG      e-mail : pet### [at] tagpovrayorg

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Cool! Now my photon mapping image works again :)
  And the source code compiled without problems (after converting CR/LF's).
Very good.

-- 
main(i,_){for(_?--i,main(i+2,"FhhQHFIJD|FQTITFN]zRFHhhTBFHhhTBFysdB"[i]
):5;i&&_>1;printf("%s",_-70?_&1?"[]":" ":(_=0,"\n")),_/=2);} /*- Warp -*/

Post a reply to this message

In article <3936DD51.984F52EA@pacbell.net>, Ken <tyl### [at] pacbellnet>
wrote:

> Nathan Kopp wrote:
> > 
> > Tony[B] <ben### [at] panamac-comnet> wrote...
> > > Unisys idiots. They're diggin' their own grave. No problem. We'll just use
> > > PNG then.
> > 
> > I'm glad you feel that way and I hope the other users will also understand.
> > Removing GIF functionality was a difficult decision to make, be we ended up
> > deciding to play it safe and not risk any lawsuits.
> 
> Was this a POV-Team decision or simply that of a patch writer ?
> 
> I for one will greatly miss the gif format if it is lost in the
> official versions of the program.

Me too, I hope they'll keep it in the official versions...
  Anton

Post a reply to this message

Anton Raves wrote:

> Me too, I hope they'll keep it in the official versions...
>   Anton

It may not be such a problem, since everything that can be done in POV with a GIF
looks like it can be done with a PNG file, including the possibility of filtering a
colour on the basis of its index number in the palette. The main immediate problem
could be the lack of (or poor) support of  the various PNG flavours (the palette
version and the alpha-channel version) by some common freeware, shareware and
low-cost image processors.

G.

Post a reply to this message

Warp wrote:
> 
>   And btw (to someone posting about gimp), gimp supports png. I don't see
> the problem.

My problem is that I have been (so far) unable to use images made from
the Gimp as heightfield unless I used grayscaled GIFs.  


-- 
Francois Labreque | The surest sign of the existence of extra-
     flabreq      | terrestrial intelligence is that they never
        @         | bothered to come down here and visit us!
  attglobal.net                                  - Calvin

Post a reply to this message

Bob Hughes wrote in message <393786d4@news.povray.org>...
>I also have to mention that someone I know of was using 16-bit Gif in
POV-Ray
>but I never have so I don't understand it's format.  Was from a Fractint
>output I believe, well actually I have no idea anymore.

That's the .pot format.  There are exactly two programs in the world that
support it: POV-Ray, and Fractint.

Mark

Post a reply to this message

Gilles Tran wrote:

> Anton Raves wrote:
>
> > Me too, I hope they'll keep it in the official versions...
> >   Anton
>
> It may not be such a problem, since everything that can be done in POV with a GIF
> looks like it can be done with a PNG file, including the possibility of filtering a
> colour on the basis of its index number in the palette. The main immediate problem
> could be the lack of (or poor) support of  the various PNG flavours (the palette
> version and the alpha-channel version) by some common freeware, shareware and
> low-cost image processors.

PNG DOES everything GIF does but for animated GIF's (which are supported by MNG).
Plus,
PNG does a lot more (just read the documentation about sophisticated image compression
preprocessing for one example).

PNG is supported by rel 4 browsers (IE4 supports it, there is just a problem: you can
add and IMG tag to a page but for unknown reasons drag-dropping the PNG file is not
supported, so many people think IE4 is not PNG aware).

GIMP works beautifully with PNGs.

Last but not least, PNG is supported by free and open source libraries (batteries not
included...)

Bye!!!

Post a reply to this message

Mark Wagner wrote:

> That's the .pot format.  There are exactly two programs in the world that
> support it: POV-Ray, and Fractint.

Make that at least three: I was able to convert a .pot file to PNG in
the GIMP.

-Mark Gordon

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In article <3938A752.3E308FEF@iol.it> , Alessandro Coppo <a.c### [at] iolit> 
wrote:

> PNG is supported by rel 4 browsers (IE4 supports it, there is just a problem:
> you can add and IMG tag to a page but for unknown reasons drag-dropping the
> PNG file is not supported, so many people think IE4 is not PNG aware).

This is only correct for IE 4 for Windows, IE 4 for Mac OS does not support
it at all (but IE 5 does).


     Thorsten

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> MegaPov 0.5a is now available for Windows and Mac (other versions will
> follow from other developers).

Woohoo! - thanks:)
The updated win32 3.1g interface is the icing on the cake:)

> PLEASE NOTE: GIF support has been removed due to the Unisys patent on LZW
> decompression.  Please view the link at the end of this message if you
want

This doesn't bother me at all, and serves them right that such a popular
graphics program (or at least a popular patch of one;) should drop their
format because of their ridiculous legal issues.


Matt

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The banner on top of that Unisys page is a gif image.  If Unisys has not
licensed itself, it will have to sue itself!  ;)
Brendan Ryan

Nathan Kopp wrote:

> MegaPov 0.5a is now available for Windows and Mac (other versions will
> follow from other developers).
>
> PLEASE NOTE: GIF support has been removed due to the Unisys patent on LZW
> decompression.  Please view the link at the end of this message if you want
> to read what Unisys has to say about licensing.
>
> The Windows version can be downloaded from:
> http://nathan.kopp.com/patched.htm
>
> The Macintosh version can be downloaded from:
> http://users.skynet.be/smellenbergh
>
> -Nathan
>
> === summary of changes ===
> * removed GIF support (potential legal issues regarding the Unisys patent)
> * fixed docs for pigment_pattern
> * fixed disc problems (removed fastdiscpatch)
> * fixed long filename support in the Windows version
> * fixed interface-related bugs (Windows version moved to 3.1g interface)
> * fixed bug with photons on average texture
> * fixed bug with media method 3 when samples = 1
> * fixed bug with parsing backwards compatibility and unofficial version
> number
> * added fastspherepatch
> * added fastpolypatch
> * fixed "bug" with mesh (MegaPov did not ignore degenerate triangles if uv
> mapping was used in the triangle)
> * fixed bug with ttf
> * fixed bug with csqr
>
> Here is the reason why GIF support has been removed:
> http://www.unisys.com/unisys/lzw/default.asp

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I have used Paintshop Pro to look at them, but only after 
changing *.pot to *.gif


Mark Gordon wrote:
> 
> Mark Wagner wrote:
> 
> > That's the .pot format.  There are exactly two programs in the world that
> > support it: POV-Ray, and Fractint.
> 
> Make that at least three: I was able to convert a .pot file to PNG in
> the GIMP.
> 
> -Mark Gordon

Post a reply to this message

In article <3938985b@news.povray.org>, "Mark Wagner" 
<mar### [at] gtenet> wrote:

> That's the .pot format.  There are exactly two programs in the world that
> support it: POV-Ray, and Fractint.

GraphicConverter(a Mac image editor) will open them, but it seems(at 
first glance, anyway) to treat them as ordinary GIF images.

-- 
Christopher James Huff - Personal e-mail: chr### [at] maccom
TAG(Technical Assistance Group) e-mail: chr### [at] tagpovrayorg
Personal Web page: http://chrishuff.dhs.org/
TAG Web page: http://tag.povray.org/

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If I am asking an old question, please forgive me.

How much MegaPOV is going to look like Povray 3.5? I mean, if I write MegaPOV
code today I am going to throw out everything or we can expect minor
modifications which can be quickly performed?

The obvious reason for asking this question is that should MegaPOV be quite
similar to Pov3.5 I am going to adopt it right away otherwise I prefer to way
for 3.5.

Thanks in advance.

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Thank you!! I would have traded gif support for any one of those fixes!

--
ICQ 74734588

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From: "Bob Hughes" <per### [at] aolcom?subject=PoV-News:>
> "Warp" <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote in message
news:3937753c@news.povray.org...
> | Now, some people may want some (still) free utilities to convert gifs
> | to pngs. Anyone know of any?
>
> IrfanView does great: http://stud1.tuwien.ac.at/~e9227474/english.htm

You can always go to http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/gif2png/
The source is available and should work for Dos, Unix, Linux and Windows.

Post a reply to this message

In povray.unofficial.patches Alessandro Coppo <a.coppo@iol.it> wrote:
: The obvious reason for asking this question is that should MegaPOV be quite
: similar to Pov3.5 I am going to adopt it right away otherwise I prefer to way
: for 3.5.

  AFAIK many megapov features will be very similar (if not identical) in
pov3.5, but not every single feature will be included, so be aware of that.

-- 
main(i,_){for(_?--i,main(i+2,"FhhQHFIJD|FQTITFN]zRFHhhTBFHhhTBFysdB"[i]
):5;i&&_>1;printf("%s",_-70?_&1?"[]":" ":(_=0,"\n")),_/=2);} /*- Warp -*/

Post a reply to this message

Chris Huff wrote:
> 
> In article <3938985b@news.povray.org>, "Mark Wagner"
> <mar### [at] gtenet> wrote:
> 
> > That's the .pot format.  There are exactly two programs in the world that
> > support it: POV-Ray, and Fractint.
> 
> GraphicConverter(a Mac image editor) will open them, but it seems(at
> first glance, anyway) to treat them as ordinary GIF images.

Actually the .pot format _is_ in gif format. The pictures are only twice
as width as the original picture, because the high 8 bits of the 16bit
picture are stored in the second half of the picture.

Post a reply to this message

I don't think that loss of GIF is that bad. I, for one, never use GIF
with POV. It supports only 8 bit color. And why is PNG the only other
option? What about PICT? It's a great format. Or JPEG? Why does anyone use
GIF anyway?
                   
                               David McCabe
                          dav### [at] maccom

> From: Anybody <any### [at] nirvananet>
> Newsgroups: 
> povray.general,povray.macintosh,povray.unofficial.patches,povray.windows
> Date: Mon, 05 Jun 2000 12:22:56 +0200
> Subject: Re: Announce: MegaPov 0.5a available.
> 
> Chris Huff wrote:
>> 
>> In article <3938985b@news.povray.org>, "Mark Wagner"
>> <mar### [at] gtenet> wrote:
>> 
>>> That's the .pot format.  There are exactly two programs in the world that
>>> support it: POV-Ray, and Fractint.
>> 
>> GraphicConverter(a Mac image editor) will open them, but it seems(at
>> first glance, anyway) to treat them as ordinary GIF images.
> 
> Actually the .pot format _is_ in gif format. The pictures are only twice
> as width as the original picture, because the high 8 bits of the 16bit
> picture are stored in the second half of the picture.

Post a reply to this message

On Mon, 05 Jun 2000 14:44:01 -0700, David <dav### [at] maccom> wrote:

> And why is PNG the only other option? What about PICT? 

PICT is primarily a "Mac" format. PNG is far more cross-patform, and
is designed specifically to be a superior replacement for the GIF
format.

>Or JPEG? 

JPEG is certainly useful, but it is too lossy and has too many
artifacts for many people's needs. 

PNG is lossless. PNG files can also be created as true-color images,
or with palettes, similar to GIF palette-based images.  JPEG images
can't be created as palette-based images. Palette-based images
actually have their uses in POV-Ray, especially as input-images.


>Why does anyone use GIF anyway?

There are some "input-file" applications that only work well with GIF.
Certain types of filtering, in their use as image_maps, for example. I
don't think PNG's behaved in exactly the same manner in all cases, but
the exact details of the descrepancies escape my memory at the moment.

Later,
Glen Berry

7no### [at] ezwvcom
(Remove the "7" to reply via email.)

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Andrea Ryan wrote:

> The banner on top of that Unisys page is a gif image.  If Unisys has not
> licensed itself, it will have to sue itself!  ;)

What's funny is it says, "We eat, sleep and drink this stuff" and then there's
pages and pages of legal issues and licensing info... yeah, they eat, sleep and
drink that all right.

--
David Fontaine     <dav### [at] faricynet>     ICQ 55354965
Please visit my website: http://www.faricy.net/~davidf/

Post a reply to this message

Did Unisys even make the GIF format? I've never heard of that before.
Who even is Unisys?

> From: David Fontaine <dav### [at] faricynet>
> Newsgroups: 
> povray.general,povray.macintosh,povray.unofficial.patches,povray.windows
> Date: Wed, 07 Jun 2000 16:51:26 -0500
> Subject: Re: Announce: MegaPov 0.5a available.
> 
> Andrea Ryan wrote:
> 
>> The banner on top of that Unisys page is a gif image.  If Unisys has not
>> licensed itself, it will have to sue itself!  ;)
> 
> What's funny is it says, "We eat, sleep and drink this stuff" and then there's
> pages and pages of legal issues and licensing info... yeah, they eat, sleep
> and
> drink that all right.
> 
> --
> David Fontaine     <dav### [at] faricynet>     ICQ 55354965
> Please visit my website: http://www.faricy.net/~davidf/
> 
>

Post a reply to this message

David wrote:
 
> Did Unisys even make the GIF format?

CompuServe made the GIF format, using an algorithm that they did not
realize had been patented by a company that had subsequently been
purchased by Unisys.  Had CompuServe known the algorithm was encumbered
by a patent, they probably would have chosen a different algorithm.

-Mark Gordon

Post a reply to this message

In article <3938f254@news.povray.org>, Thorsten Froehlich
<tho### [at] trfde> wrote:

> In article <3938A752.3E308FEF@iol.it> , Alessandro Coppo <a.c### [at] iolit> 
> wrote:
> 
> > PNG is supported by rel 4 browsers (IE4 supports it, there is just a
> > problem:
> > you can add and IMG tag to a page but for unknown reasons drag-dropping the
> > PNG file is not supported, so many people think IE4 is not PNG aware).
> 
> This is only correct for IE 4 for Windows, IE 4 for Mac OS does not support
> it at all (but IE 5 does).
> 
> 
>      Thorsten

How about Netscape...?
  Anton

Post a reply to this message

In article <080620001739487380%a.r### [at] directa2000nl> , Anton Raves 
<a.r### [at] directa2000nl>  wrote:

>> This is only correct for IE 4 for Windows, IE 4 for Mac OS does not support
>> it at all (but IE 5 does).
>>
>>
>>      Thorsten
>
> How about Netscape...?

In some higher 4.0x (4.04?) or so minimal support is integrated, on the Mac,
and on all other platforms as well, I guess.


      Thorsten


____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

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> * fixed interface-related bugs (Windows version moved to 3.1g interface)

I still get lines of garbage in the message window, but the about box says
3.1g, could you have mixed up some files? Can anyone confirm this?

Post a reply to this message

Jetlag wrote:

> > * fixed interface-related bugs (Windows version moved to 3.1g interface)
>
> I still get lines of garbage in the message window, but the about box says
> 3.1g, could you have mixed up some files? Can anyone confirm this?

I only get the garbage using blue rock but not any of the other backgrounds
BTW I looked a MegaPOV.exe with a resource ripper & the blue rock bitmap has ~
4 lines of pixels where the blue is all the same colour and about 1/3 -1/2 the
way across the next line is also like this.
I also checked pvengine.exe & my home custom compile but neither had these
artifacts - So maybe Nathan should redownload the win3.1g src archive & make
sure the bitmap he compiles with is the correct one & has no artifacts.
BTW this still doesn't explain the colours I see - sometimes all one colour
(black/white/others), sometimes pinks, blue, grey & others - tiled pattern

Bye
Pabs

Post a reply to this message

I did like someone had suggested and updated Internet Explorer to the latest
non-beta version and haven't seen anything go wrong since, along with using
the WinMegaPov 0.5a version.

Guess you're using NT, Pabs?  And Jetlag, a beta of IE or something?  May be
specific troubles to those.

I also tried to see if I could "soft-crash" MegaPov just now by doing Selected
Area renders over and over again.  100+ times and all fine.  I've been wanting
to try counting that before.

Bob

"Pabs" <pab### [at] hotmailcom> wrote in message
news:39408314.89A734AF@hotmail.com...
| Jetlag wrote:
|
| > > * fixed interface-related bugs (Windows version moved to 3.1g interface)
| >
| > I still get lines of garbage in the message window, but the about box says
| > 3.1g, could you have mixed up some files? Can anyone confirm this?
|
| I only get the garbage using blue rock but not any of the other backgrounds
| BTW I looked a MegaPOV.exe with a resource ripper & the blue rock bitmap has
~
| 4 lines of pixels where the blue is all the same colour and about 1/3 -1/2
the
| way across the next line is also like this.
| I also checked pvengine.exe & my home custom compile but neither had these
| artifacts - So maybe Nathan should redownload the win3.1g src archive & make
| sure the bitmap he compiles with is the correct one & has no artifacts.
| BTW this still doesn't explain the colours I see - sometimes all one colour
| (black/white/others), sometimes pinks, blue, grey & others - tiled pattern
|
| Bye
| Pabs
|
|

Post a reply to this message

> I only get the garbage using blue rock but not any of the other
backgrounds
> BTW I looked a MegaPOV.exe with a resource ripper & the blue rock bitmap
has ~
> 4 lines of pixels where the blue is all the same colour and about 1/3 -1/2
the
> way across the next line is also like this.
> I also checked pvengine.exe & my home custom compile but neither had these
> artifacts - So maybe Nathan should redownload the win3.1g src archive &
make
> sure the bitmap he compiles with is the correct one & has no artifacts.
> BTW this still doesn't explain the colours I see - sometimes all one
colour
> (black/white/others), sometimes pinks, blue, grey & others - tiled pattern

Hey, I think you're right. It appears as though the blue rock bitmap is
corrupted.

Post a reply to this message

When this HooHa started I was under the impression that the algorithm
was patented _after_ CS produced the GIF format but before Unisys was
involved. I was wrong?

--
Alf

http://www.peake42.freeserve.co.uk/
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/Alf_Peake/


Mark Gordon <mtg### [at] mailbagcom> wrote in message
news:393EE7E5.84E8A8E6@mailbag.com...
> David wrote:
>
> > Did Unisys even make the GIF format?
>
> CompuServe made the GIF format, using an algorithm that they did not
> realize had been patented by a company that had subsequently been
> purchased by Unisys.  Had CompuServe known the algorithm was
encumbered
> by a patent, they probably would have chosen a different algorithm.
>
> -Mark Gordon

Post a reply to this message

Alf Peake wrote:
> 
> When this HooHa started I was under the impression that the algorithm
> was patented _after_ CS produced the GIF format but before Unisys was
> involved. I was wrong?

Digging out books...

1984 - LZW compression invented and written up in IEEE Computer
1985 - LZW patent approved
1986 - Sperry (patent holder) merged with Burroughs to form Unisys, not
quite a purchase like I remembered
1987 - CompuServe creates GIF
1993 - Unisys becomes aware that GIF uses LZW compression

This paraphrased from Encyclopedia of Graphics File Formats, 2nd ed.

-Mark Gordn

Post a reply to this message

Mark Gordon wrote in message <39421BB5.AB8BA839@mailbag.com>...
>Digging out books...
>
>1984 - LZW compression invented and written up in IEEE Computer
>1985 - LZW patent approved
>1986 - Sperry (patent holder) merged with Burroughs to form Unisys, not
>quite a purchase like I remembered
>1987 - CompuServe creates GIF
>1993 - Unisys becomes aware that GIF uses LZW compression


Good news!  If the dates here are correct, the patent on LZW will expire in
two years.

Mark

Post a reply to this message

"Mark Wagner" <mar### [at] gtenet> wrote in message
news:394313ef@news.povray.org...
>
> Mark Gordon wrote in message <39421BB5.AB8BA839@mailbag.com>...
> >Digging out books...
> >
> >1984 - LZW compression invented and written up in IEEE Computer
> >1985 - LZW patent approved
> >1986 - Sperry (patent holder) merged with Burroughs to form Unisys, not
> >quite a purchase like I remembered
> >1987 - CompuServe creates GIF
> >1993 - Unisys becomes aware that GIF uses LZW compression
>
>
> Good news!  If the dates here are correct, the patent on LZW will expire
in
> two years.

What I do not understand:

When LZW was published 1984,
how can it be patented in 1985?

I mean as soon as I publish an idea in a newspaper,
it's not any more possible to patent it,
because the idea is general knowledge because
was published before


--
Mösl Roland http://www.pege.org
Clear targets for a confused civilization
http://www.BeingFound.com
web design and seminars
+43 699 17343674

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Many thanks for that Mark. I think my memory need replacing :)

Alf

Mark Gordon <mtg### [at] mailbagcom> wrote in message
news:39421BB5.AB8BA839@mailbag.com...
> Alf Peake wrote:
> >
> > When this HooHa started I was under the impression that the
algorithm
> > was patented _after_ CS produced the GIF format but before Unisys
was
> > involved. I was wrong?
>
> Digging out books...
>
> 1984 - LZW compression invented and written up in IEEE Computer
> 1985 - LZW patent approved
> 1986 - Sperry (patent holder) merged with Burroughs to form Unisys,
not
> quite a purchase like I remembered
> 1987 - CompuServe creates GIF
> 1993 - Unisys becomes aware that GIF uses LZW compression
>
> This paraphrased from Encyclopedia of Graphics File Formats, 2nd ed.
>
> -Mark Gordn

Post a reply to this message

In povray.general "Mösl Roland" <fou### [at] pegeorg> wrote:
: What I do not understand:

: When LZW was published 1984,
: how can it be patented in 1985?

  The patent was approved in 1985. It doesn't mean that the patent application
was made in 1985. The approval of a patent is always a very long process.

-- 
main(i,_){for(_?--i,main(i+2,"FhhQHFIJD|FQTITFN]zRFHhhTBFHhhTBFysdB"[i]
):5;i&&_>1;printf("%s",_-70?_&1?"[]":" ":(_=0,"\n")),_/=2);} /*- Warp -*/

Post a reply to this message

On Sun, 11 Jun 2000 08:37:22 +0200, Mösl Roland wrote:
>"Mark Wagner" <mar### [at] gtenet> wrote in message
>news:394313ef@news.povray.org...
>>
>> Mark Gordon wrote in message <39421BB5.AB8BA839@mailbag.com>...
>> >1984 - LZW compression invented and written up in IEEE Computer
>> >1985 - LZW patent approved
>
>What I do not understand:
>
>When LZW was published 1984,
>how can it be patented in 1985?
>
>I mean as soon as I publish an idea in a newspaper,
>it's not any more possible to patent it,
>because the idea is general knowledge because
>was published before

That's not quite correct. The "prior art" rule prevents people from
patenting things which they did not invent themselves (otherwise
somebody might patent the wheel and then sue all the car manufacturers).
If you invent something, you can certainly show it or describe it to any
number of people and still patent it. However, it might be somewhat
difficult to prove that you are the inventor, if you show it to too many
people. As other people already pointed out, it takes some time to
approve a patent (if fact, 1 year seems to be remarkably short!).

However, I don't understand something else: When the issue first came up
in 1993, everybody seemed to think that only the compression algorithm
was covered by the patent, not the decompression (That's why gzip can
read .Z-files, but cannot create them). However, the patent cited here
very clearly mentions decompression, too. Are there two patents about
LZW?

	hp

-- 
   _  | Peter J. Holzer    | Nicht an Tueren mangelt es,
|_|_) | Sysadmin WSR       | sondern an der Einrichtung (aka Content).
| |   | hjp### [at] wsracat      |    -- Ale### [at] univieacat
__/   | http://www.hjp.at/ |       zum Thema Portale in at.linux

Post a reply to this message

Wasn't it Peter J. Holzer who wrote:
>On Sun, 11 Jun 2000 08:37:22 +0200, Mösl Roland wrote:
>>"Mark Wagner" <mar### [at] gtenet> wrote in message
>>news:394313ef@news.povray.org...
>>>
>>> Mark Gordon wrote in message <39421BB5.AB8BA839@mailbag.com>...
>>> >1984 - LZW compression invented and written up in IEEE Computer
>>> >1985 - LZW patent approved
>>
>>What I do not understand:
>>
>>When LZW was published 1984,
>>how can it be patented in 1985?
>>
>>I mean as soon as I publish an idea in a newspaper,
>>it's not any more possible to patent it,
>>because the idea is general knowledge because
>>was published before
>
>That's not quite correct. The "prior art" rule prevents people from
>patenting things which they did not invent themselves (otherwise
>somebody might patent the wheel and then sue all the car manufacturers).
>If you invent something, you can certainly show it or describe it to any
>number of people and still patent it. However, it might be somewhat
>difficult to prove that you are the inventor, if you show it to too many
>people. As other people already pointed out, it takes some time to
>approve a patent (if fact, 1 year seems to be remarkably short!).

I don't think that "prior art" is the rule in question here. If you
publish details of your invention and then later apply for a patent,
that patent is not going to retrospectively protect you from people
using what you have already published. 

>However, I don't understand something else: When the issue first came up
>in 1993, everybody seemed to think that only the compression algorithm
>was covered by the patent, not the decompression (That's why gzip can
>read .Z-files, but cannot create them). However, the patent cited here
>very clearly mentions decompression, too. Are there two patents about
>LZW?

The owners of the patent wanted people to freely implement decompression
routines. The basic idea being that this would generate a huge user base
of people who had software that could read the files, but anyone who
wanted to create files to distribute to those users would use software
which was licensed to use the compression algorithm.

-- 
Mike Williams
Gentleman of Leisure

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"Mike Williams" <mik### [at] nospamplease> wrote in message
news:My4### [at] econymdemoncouk...
> Wasn't it Peter J. Holzer who wrote:
> >On Sun, 11 Jun 2000 08:37:22 +0200, Mösl Roland wrote:
> >>"Mark Wagner" <mar### [at] gtenet> wrote in message
> >>news:394313ef@news.povray.org...
> >>>
> >>> Mark Gordon wrote in message <39421BB5.AB8BA839@mailbag.com>...
> >>> >1984 - LZW compression invented and written up in IEEE Computer
> >>> >1985 - LZW patent approved
> >>
> >>What I do not understand:
> >>
> >>When LZW was published 1984,
> >>how can it be patented in 1985?
> >>
> >>I mean as soon as I publish an idea in a newspaper,
> >>it's not any more possible to patent it,
> >>because the idea is general knowledge because
> >>was published before
> >
> >That's not quite correct. The "prior art" rule prevents people from
> >patenting things which they did not invent themselves (otherwise
> >somebody might patent the wheel and then sue all the car manufacturers).
> >If you invent something, you can certainly show it or describe it to any
> >number of people and still patent it. However, it might be somewhat
> >difficult to prove that you are the inventor, if you show it to too many
> >people. As other people already pointed out, it takes some time to
> >approve a patent (if fact, 1 year seems to be remarkably short!).
>
> I don't think that "prior art" is the rule in question here. If you
> publish details of your invention and then later apply for a patent,

If You publish something in a newspaper,
it's not possible to have a patent later.
Because publishing it makes it general knowledge.

There was once the application for a patent to raise
sunken ships by blowing styrofoam balls into it.

The application was turned down, because it was
public knowledge to do so.
In the 50ties, it was published in a Mickey Mouse
that Donald Duck has raised a sunken ship by
blowing tennis balls into it.


--
Mösl Roland http://www.pege.org
Clear targets for a confused civilization
http://www.BeingFound.com
web design and seminars
+43 699 17343674

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On Mon, 12 Jun 2000 08:12:11 +0200, Mösl Roland wrote:
>If You publish something in a newspaper,
>it's not possible to have a patent later.
>Because publishing it makes it general knowledge.

35 USC 10 sec. 102:

A person shall be entitled to a patent unless - 

     (b) the invention was patented or described in a printed publication 
         in this or a foreign country or in public use or on sale in this
         country, more than one year prior to the date of the application 
         for patent in the United States, or 

-- 
Ron Parker   http://www2.fwi.com/~parkerr/traces.html
My opinions.  Mine.  Not anyone else's.

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Bob Hughes wrote:

> I did like someone had suggested and updated Internet Explorer to the latest
> non-beta version and haven't seen anything go wrong since, along with using
> the WinMegaPov 0.5a version.
>
> Guess you're using NT, Pabs?  And Jetlag, a beta of IE or something?  May be
> specific troubles to those.

I am using IE 5 on win95 at home & IE5 on NT at uni - the garbage is different on
different sessions & sometimes between launches of MegaPOV on both platforms

Pabs

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"Pabs" <pab### [at] hotmailcom> wrote in message
news:3945D190.E60D62AB@hotmail.com...
| Bob Hughes wrote:
|
| > I did like someone had suggested and updated Internet Explorer to the
latest
| > non-beta version and haven't seen anything go wrong since, along with
using
| > the WinMegaPov 0.5a version.
| >
| > Guess you're using NT, Pabs?  And Jetlag, a beta of IE or something?  May
be
| > specific troubles to those.
|
| I am using IE 5 on win95 at home & IE5 on NT at uni - the garbage is
different on
| different sessions & sometimes between launches of MegaPOV on both platforms

I should add that in using WindowBlinds, a GUI modification on my Win 98 SE,
often the text menu bar disappears still in MegaPov, but also in other
programs only while MegaPov is running, which makes it seem there is a tie
with MegaPov being the cause of some graphics related problem.  I'm not
positive about this though.

Bob

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"Bob Hughes" <per### [at] aolcom?subject=PoV-News:> writes:
> 
> |   Now, some people may want some (still) free utilities to convert gifs to
> | pngs. Anyone know of any?
> 
> IrfanView does great: http://stud1.tuwien.ac.at/~e9227474/english.htm

For those using unix I suggest gif2png. Personally, I converted several images
with version 0.6 from ftp://ftp.fu-berlin.de/unix/graphics/png/ . There is
however a successor available at http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/gif2png/ .

Thomas

-- 
http://thomas.willhalm.de/ (includes pgp key)

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Ken wrote:
> 
> Nathan Kopp wrote:
> >
> > Tony[B] <ben### [at] panamac-comnet> wrote...
> > > Unisys idiots. They're diggin' their own grave. No problem. We'll just use
> > > PNG then.
> >
> > I'm glad you feel that way and I hope the other users will also understand.
> > Removing GIF functionality was a difficult decision to make, be we ended up
> > deciding to play it safe and not risk any lawsuits.
> 
> Was this a POV-Team decision or simply that of a patch writer ?
> 
> I for one will greatly miss the gif format if it is lost in the
> official versions of the program.
> 

Losing GIF support is not much of an issue IMHO, PNG is a much superior
format.
OK if you have scenes which use GIFs as image_maps, they will need
modification but as far as I'm concerned GIF is dead.

PoD.

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And the people say:
PNG PNG PNG PNG PNG PNG

Q: Can someone direct me to images on the web which are:
a) still PNG?
b) PNG animations, if such a thing exists?

Want to check out my web browsers........

Nathan Kopp wrote:

> PLEASE NOTE: GIF support has been removed due to the Unisys patent on LZW
> decompression.  Please view the link at the end of this message if you want
> to read what Unisys has to say about licensing.
>
> Here is the reason why GIF support has been removed:
> http://www.unisys.com/unisys/lzw/default.asp

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"Greg M. Johnson" <gre### [at] my-dejanewscom> writes:

> And the people say:
> PNG PNG PNG PNG PNG PNG
> 
> Q: Can someone direct me to images on the web which are:
> a) still PNG?

My web page about fractals at http://members.tripod.de/willhalm/ uses
only png. (If your browsers don't work, please tell me.)

Thomas

-- 
http://thomas.willhalm.de/ (includes pgp key)

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"Greg M. Johnson" wrote:

> Q: Can someone direct me to images on the web which are:
> a) still PNG?
http://www-mddsp.enel.ucalgary.ca/People/adilger/logo/
Andreas Dilger's collection of Tux PNG's.

> b) PNG animations, if such a thing exists?
There's this thing called MNG.  It's not quite so mature, and I don't
know where to find any off the top of my head.

-Mark Gordon

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Greg M. Johnson <gre### [at] my-dejanewscom> wrote...
> And the people say:
> PNG PNG PNG PNG PNG PNG
>
> Q: Can someone direct me to images on the web which are:
> a) still PNG?
> b) PNG animations, if such a thing exists?

Not that either of these matter in relation to POV....  ;-)

Really, what does GIF support bring to POV?
1) the ability to use images without conversion.  Well... I guess if you
want to use a stock GIF image now you'll have to convert it to something
else.  Oh, well.  On the positive side, with POV 3.5 you'll be able to use
JPG files directly.
2) palette support.  PNG provides this support.
3) compression.  PNG provides compression ratios very similar to (usually a
bit better than) GIF.

For POV scenes, we don't use GIF animation and we really don't care if web
browsers provide great support or not.  All I care about is if I can easily
and freely convert the image I wish to use into a format that POV will read
without losing any quality or functionality.  And that is possible with
gif2png, as well as with paint programs such as Paint Shop Pro and/or
Photoshop.

-Nathan

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In article <39379B26.DA819A06@my-dejanews.com>, 
gre### [at] my-dejanewscom wrote:

>And the people say:
>PNG PNG PNG PNG PNG PNG
>
>Q: Can someone direct me to images on the web which are:
>a) still PNG?
>b) PNG animations, if such a thing exists?

No PNG animations, but I have one transparent PNG image on my POV "image 
basics" page at http://www.hoboes.com/html/NetLife/POV/images/

Jerry

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Nathan Kopp wrote:

> For POV scenes, we don't use GIF animation and we really don't care if web
> browsers provide great support or not.  All I care about is if I can easily
> and freely convert the image I wish to use into a format that POV will read
> without losing any quality or functionality.  And that is possible with
> gif2png, as well as with paint programs such as Paint Shop Pro and/or
> Photoshop.
>
> -Nathan

No argument whatsoever on the legal necessity of removing GIF support.

I, too, support the general philosophy of groups like burnallgifs.org.
However, there is one thing that GIFs are marvelous for: animation! See, if you
haven't already:

http://www.geocities.com/pterandon/back.html

How could I do this w/o GIF's?

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Greg M. Johnson <gre### [at] my-dejanewscom> wrote:
:> For POV scenes, we don't use GIF animation and we really don't care if web
:> browsers provide great support or not.

: I, too, support the general philosophy of groups like burnallgifs.org.
: However, there is one thing that GIFs are marvelous for: animation!

  He expressly said that we don't care.

-- 
main(i,_){for(_?--i,main(i+2,"FhhQHFIJD|FQTITFN]zRFHhhTBFHhhTBFysdB"[i]
):5;i&&_>1;printf("%s",_-70?_&1?"[]":" ":(_=0,"\n")),_/=2);} /*- Warp -*/

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