XFree86 3.3.5 released

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Posted by justin++ on Wednesday September 1, 1999 @05:14AM from the savage4+qnx-support dept.

DirkHohndel writes "The XFree86 Project has released XFree86-3.3.5. The release notes should be a good first place to start. It might take the mirrors a while to get updated, distribution specific packages for SuSE, Red Hat and Debian should be available at their web sites, soon. Dirk " Dirk was also kind enough to include a short list of importat features which can be viewed below.

Support for S3 Savage4 and Savage3D. Limited to Linux/x86 at this point.
Support for S3 Trio3D/2X.
Support for DGux.
Support for QNX.
Fix bug in Mach64 server on Rage LT and Rage LT Pro.
Fix SiS driver for 530 and 620.
Fix the spurious underline problem on NVidia Riva TNT cards.
Fix the PS/2 mouse problem with later Linux kernels.
Misc updates and bugfixes in Rendition driver.
Updates from SuSE and Red Hat, including more keyboards, PAM support, ARM and AXP fixes, security fixes.

10 of 101 comments (clear)

Min score:

Reason:

Sort:

Re:Anti-Alias Update by Gleef · 1999-09-01 00:42 · Score: 2

The latest skinny is the same as the old skinny. The X Window System, and applications that use it, assume that a rendered font will be in monochrome (one bit per pixel). Anti-aliasing requires multiple bits per pixel. Implementing anti-aliased fonts at the X Windows level is unmanagably difficult.

There are widget libraries that do their own text rendering with anti-aliasing, and Berlin does anti-aliasing for fonts. I don't see X11 ever supporting it directly.

----

--

----
Open mind, insert foot.
Re:Riva TNT2? by Gleef · 1999-09-01 00:46 · Score: 2

Yes it is, and that's in the FAQ:

XFree86 Faq, Q.F12.

----

--

----
Open mind, insert foot.
Re:Anti-Alias Update by Trepidity · 1999-09-01 04:29 · Score: 2

I'd have to disagree with that assessment. I've found anti-alised fonts to be extremely useful, especially when you want to incorporate fonts into graphic design work. 9 point Verdana on my 800x600 monitor looks fine when anti-aliased =)

--
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Re:Anti-Alias Update by Sneakums · 1999-09-01 00:49 · Score: 2

Well, if you want anti-aliased fonts under X, you can use something like GNOME's Canvas to draw using anti-aliasing.

It's worth pointing out that they way MS has anti-aliased fonts in Windows is totally wrong. What's the point of anti-aliasing a 72-point font? It's small fonts that have the most to gain from anti-aliasing. For an example, look at how Acorn's RISC OS implemented anti-aliased fonts: they applied it to small ones, making it perfectly possible to edit 10-point Times on a 640x256 screen.

Furthermore, I don't believe that anti-aliasing is much use, except for intricate fonts such as Zapf Chancery. I use Verdana and xfsft for pretty much everything. Verdana is wonderfully readable down to about 9 points on my 1152x896 display, mainly because of the hinting logic that is in most Truetype fonts, as opposed to Type1 fonts, which have to rely on the generic hinting logic in the rasteriser.

Anti-aliased fonts are more of a "tick-box" feature than a real advance.

Paul.
Ditto... by luge · 1999-09-01 00:53 · Score: 2

The X group, despite having one of the most complex support tasks of any debian maintainer, is also consistently one of the fastest to respond when upstream upgrades. More power to them... (and, of course, more power to the upstream guys who provide stuff to keep the Debian maintainers busy...)
-luge

--
IAAL,BIANLY
Libre or Gratis? by MenTaLguY · 1999-09-01 03:35 · Score: 2

Since MS's TrueType fonts aren't free, does anyone know where I can get free/gpl versions of the common TrueType fonts (arial, times new roman, etc)?

If you mean free as in beer, then you ought to check out http://www.microsoft.com/t ypography/fontpack/default.htm. You can use infozip on the self-extracting archives. Work quite nicely with xfstt.

Berlin-- http://www.berlin-consortium.org

--

DNA just wants to be free...
Re:What PS/2 mouse problem? by John+Fulmer · 1999-09-01 02:44 · Score: 2

I have a problem where the cursor occasionally gets 'stuck' in the upper right hand corner of the screen and I have to kill X to get it back. This started happening right after the PS/2 code was merged with the keyboard driver.

I HOPE this is what they fixed... :)

jf
Re:AccelX by scrytch · 1999-09-02 00:34 · Score: 2

Because the equivalent function in WTS costs even more? Thank you drive through.

--
I've finally had it: until slashdot gets article moderation, I am not coming back.
Re:Rage 128 support by DirkHohndel · 1999-09-01 13:36 · Score: 2

We will have an XFCom_Rage128 server next week.

It should show up at the XSuSE website around Sept. 7 or so.

Dirk
Re:Upgrade, "strongly reccomended" ? by absolute · 1999-09-01 02:44 · Score: 3

When I upgraded from 3.3.3 to 3.3.4 I noticed a slight speed increase using my V3 3000.

Using Xengine as a benchmark :), i went from 1000RPM to about 3000RPM...

Hopefully the debian team will have it out in a day or so in .debs for potato (I love bleeding edge).