January 2007 - Fractdev - mailman.xmission.com

Athlon woes
by Tim Wegner 03 Sep '08

03 Sep '08

I built a computer last year using an Athlon with a Gigabyte motherboard. I had troubles with Fractint - with any SVGA mode the computer would hang after the completion of the image. I always assumed this was an Windows XP issue. Today I tried Fractint with freedos on the same computer, with the same results. So apparently it's an incompatability bgetween fractint and my compuiter. Truecolor, 320x200, diskvideo, and even tweaked modes work. SCGA modes fail, and only after the image completes. This behavior appears to have nothing to do with recent versions. Has anyone else had trouble with Athlon? Hmm, maybe I need to look at bios settings. Tim

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beta 1
by Richard 13 Feb '07

13 Feb '07

OK, here is an initial stab at a beta. Known issues: - Sometimes the window size is confused when switching video modes. Workaround: switch to another mode, then switch back to the desired mode - After zooming around for a while with PAGEUP, the image freezes and the zoom box is not properly removed even when not zooming. Workaround: maybe changing a parameter slightly will help resync. - If the screen doesn't appear correctly, give it a second to flush any pending updates. You can also try minimizing/restoring the window to force a fulls creen repaint. - Close button most likely doesn't cause the app to exit all the way <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/fractals/fractdev/FractIntSetup-21.00.bet…> -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html> Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>

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x11 update
by Richard 06 Feb '07

06 Feb '07

OK, I've got everything linking now on X11 with the exception of one unresolved symbol which I'm tracking down... This is just stubs on some routines on the X11 side, but at least I've gotten the driver back in sync. -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html> Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>

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How you can help (was: [Fractdev] beta 3)
by Richard 31 Jan '07

31 Jan '07

I was originally writing this to Paul, but it became a general audience message :-). In article <002201c74408$28210bf0$0301a8c0@Production>, "Paul" <pdeleeuw(a)deleeuw.com.au> writes: > Let me know how I can help. How's your x86 assembly? :-P Seriously, we could really use some help on getting C versions of the existing x86 assembly fractal code. I've already taken care of the code in the non-fractal computing assembly files, with C code created for the X11 port and my driver abstraction (which takes care of the keyboard and video stuff). This could be done by tweaking the assembly and putting it in an __asm {} block, or it could be done by translating the assembly code into C, whichever is easiest for whoever does it :-). > One other thing I would like to do is real time 3d > transforms rather than all the tedious mucking about with files. For the 3D stuff, trust me I soooo understand what you're talking about! However, going back to the roadmap I posted earlier, there is more work to do on the 'basics' of the application before I think we should add more features. I mean, its great the way fractint evolved organically but that evolution has run up a cul-de-sac with the 16-bit assembly and DOSisms. Right now, we're still saddled with them -- I'm mostly dodging bullets and faking things out! I like the things you want to add -- but we still have to gut this house and reconstruct it a little bit more. Its like Katrina hit the fractint code and I've made it so the roof doesn't leak anymore, but don't try to use the bathroom! :) I haven't even gotten the X11 driver up and working yet. We need to do that in this "limp along" world so that we can merge back onto the HEAD. It makes sense for me to do this as i) I know X11, ii) I know the driver code having done 2 drivers for it so far (Win32 disk and Win32 GDI), iii) I know the code as it stands on the branch. Also, the sound code is not there yet. It should probably use DirectSound or some such. How's your knowledge of the sound stuff? The code on the branch is completely gutted of all the weird overlay and 16-bit isms that are still on the HEAD. All near/medium/far pointer stuff is GONE. All overlay stuff is GONE. All the assembly code is GONE. (Well, there's a tiny bit that I inlined as __asm {} blocks as a stopgap for the moment; I don't know if it works right.) The priorities right now are: - get C/__asm versions of all the assembly fractal computing code - get the X11 driver working - get the sound support back - get the Win32 code working in indexed color desktops *That* will be the end of the beta, and that's still quite a bit of work. Once we are that stage, then I want to: - separate engine from UI code - change the UI from polling to event driven - create a real Win32 UI (what we have now is Win32 pretending to look like CGA text screens) Then I will feel like its time to add new features. I know that probably dampens your enthusiasm as none of the things I outlined above are "fun". They're plodding, boring and require fairly extensive reworks to the existing code base. The application architecture of fractint is as old as fractint itself -- 15+ years -- and it shows. I wasn't there at the time, but when the Windows 3.1 port was done, IMO it should have gutted the DOS architecture and gone whole hog Windows. I can only guess that it didn't happen that way because screen updates in 3.1 were slow compared to DOS, which is why DOOM was written as a DOS app and not as a Windows app. However, clinging to the DOS world -- while initially a reasonable compromise -- has left us in the situation we have today. People just aren't interested in working on it that much until it becomes like a "normal" Win32 application. Even though I've made it *work* under Win32, its still far from "normal". Places where others could help out today: - get C versions of the assembly code that computes fractal types - work on the X11 driver (anyone could do it if they know X11; I just don't think anyone else is interested!) - add more fractal types (can you ever have enough?!?) this sort of feature is not impacted by the UI much - implement Win32 sound support As I say above, I know these aren't "fun" but they are necessary if we want fractint to continue... All my opinion, of course; who else's opinion would it be? -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html> Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>

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beta 3
by Richard 29 Jan '07

29 Jan '07

OK, this is the one we want to spread out to the wider audiences... <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/fractals/fractdev/FractIntSetup-21.00.bet…> or <http://tinyurl.com/ysgsdq> I believe this fixes all the bugs reported so far. Known issues: - Probably won't work right on an 8-bit (or less) windows desktop with a real hardware colormap; 16-bit, 24-bit and 32-bit desktops should be fine. This will be fixed at some point. - Ctrl NumPad+/NumPad- should work now, but my laptop doesn't have a separate number pad, so... -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html> Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>

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assembly code migration
by Richard 28 Jan '07

28 Jan '07

Tim, Earlier you mentioned that you would be interested in seeing how you could help out with the new code on the branch. One thing that would be really great is if we could get the existing assembly code migrated to 32-bit assembly and inlined as asm {} blocks. Currently on the branch (post beta 3) I've added stub routines for the missing assembly code. They are all in the win32 folder. I've removed the #ifdefs that prevented the L_MATH and M_MATH routines from being linked into the code. Stub routines were added with _ASSERTEs that will throw up a dialog box when they are called in the debug build. In release, they will probably have unexpected behavior as I just return 0 all the time for any return value and that's probably not a good thing for all these functions. The stub routines are: mpmath_c.c: MP2d086 MP2d386 MPadd MPadd086 MPadd386 MPcmp MPcmp086 MPcmp386 MPdiv MPdiv086 MPdiv386 MPmul MPmul086 MPmul386 d2MP d2MP086 d2MP386 fg2MP calmanfp.c: calcmandfpasm_287 calcmandfpasm_87 calmanfp5.c: calcmandfpasm_p5 calcmandfpasmstart_p5 parsera.c: Img_Setup fFormula fStkACos fStkACosh fStkAND fStkANDClr2 fStkASin fStkASinh fStkATan fStkATanh fStkAbs fStkAdd fStkCAbs fStkCeil fStkClr1 fStkClr2 fStkCoTan fStkCoTanh fStkConj fStkCos fStkCosXX fStkCosh fStkDbl fStkDiv fStkEQ fStkEndInit fStkExp fStkFlip fStkFloor fStkGT fStkGT2 fStkGTE fStkIdent fStkImag fStkImagFlip fStkJump fStkJumpLabel fStkJumpOnFalse fStkJumpOnTrue fStkLT fStkLT2 fStkLTE fStkLTE2 fStkLod fStkLodAdd fStkLodConj fStkLodDbl fStkLodDup fStkLodEQ fStkLodGT fStkLodGT2 fStkLodGTE fStkLodGTE2 fStkLodImag fStkLodImagAbs fStkLodImagAdd fStkLodImagFlip fStkLodImagMul fStkLodImagSub fStkLodLT fStkLodLT2 fStkLodLTE fStkLodLTE2 fStkLodLTEAnd2 fStkLodLTEMul fStkLodLTMul fStkLodMod2 fStkLodMul fStkLodNE fStkLodReal fStkLodRealAbs fStkLodRealAdd fStkLodRealC fStkLodRealFlip fStkLodRealMul fStkLodRealPwr fStkLodRealSub fStkLodSqr fStkLodSqr2 fStkLodSub fStkLodSubMod fStkLog fStkMod fStkMod2 fStkMul fStkNE fStkNeg fStkOR fStkORClr2 fStkOne fStkPLodAdd fStkPLodSub fStkPull2 fStkPush2 fStkPush2a fStkPush4 fStkPwr fStkReal fStkReal2 fStkRealFlip fStkRecip fStkRound fStkSin fStkSinh fStkSqr fStkSqr0 fStkSqr3 fStkSqrt fStkSto fStkSto2 fStkStoClr1 fStkStoClr2 fStkStoDbl fStkStoDup fStkStoMod2 fStkStoSqr fStkStoSqr0 fStkSub fStkTan fStkTanh fStkTrunc fStkZero fform_per_pixel -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html> Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>

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mpmath_a.asm
by Richard 28 Jan '07

28 Jan '07

Did this code ever exist as C code before being written as assembly? Maybe I could steal C implementations from earlier releases.... -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html> Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>

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memory leak in miscres.c (ifs_defn)
by Richard 25 Jan '07

25 Jan '07

In miscres.c, routine ifsload(), line 1438 is this code: if ((ifs_defn = (float far *)farmemalloc( (long)((NUMIFS+1)*IFS3DPARM*sizeof(float)))) == NULL) { which allocates some memory into ifs_defn. Earlier in this same function, the same pointer is checked to see if it is non-NULL and if so, it is freed before being allocated later in the function. However, once allocated, this memory will always be allocated because it will only be freed right before we're ready to allocate memory for it again. So, you get a memory leak. What's the right place to release the memory? -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html> Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>

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alpha 1
by Richard 25 Jan '07

25 Jan '07

Changes: - fractint.cfg supported with new driver field - driver for each mode displayed on video mode screen - intro screen spacebar issue fixed - better text screen updates - better banner image on setup dialogs - install *.doc files as *.txt, cause that's what they are... - add shortcuts to .txt files and to install folder Known issues: - saved image is wrong - makedoc= doesn't work right - keyboard input is still a little funky in places/at times <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/fractals/fractdev/FractIntSetup-21.00.alp…> If you install this version on a machine with alpha 0, it will be upgraded to alpha 1. There is an on-again off-again issue with the keyboard input. I think it stems from me trying to steal too much code from xfractint and not writing it from scratch :-). At any rate, its better now, but I can still manage to get it confused occasionally. Feedback appreciated. -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html> Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>

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beta 2
by Richard 24 Jan '07

24 Jan '07

<http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/fractals/fractdev/FractIntSetup-21.00.bet…> Fixed: - updside-down image issue - up arrow/down arrow mixup issue - palette editor displays, but R00/G00/B00 text is wrong -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html> Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>

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