flashjazzcat Posted March 8, 2012 Author Share Posted March 8, 2012 I wonder if it might be possible to have this GUI running on two screens in the case of an Atari with VBXE installed? I'm not up to snuff on what exactly the VBXE does, but if it's possible to have RGB and composite/s-video outputs to two monitors at the same time and have desktop cross-over that would rock! Possible, but it would require use of the VBXE XDL and if we're going to do that on a VBXE machine we might as well write a VBXE graphics driver for the GUI and have a 640x400 interlaced desktop in 16 colours. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gunstar Posted March 8, 2012 Share Posted March 8, 2012 Well, it was just an exciting thought. I don't have a VBXE right now, I'm not sure if I want one (depends on support) and if I decide I want one, if they will even be available. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
venom4728a Posted March 8, 2012 Share Posted March 8, 2012 I wonder if it might be possible to have this GUI running on two screens in the case of an Atari with VBXE installed? I'm not up to snuff on what exactly the VBXE does, but if it's possible to have RGB and composite/s-video outputs to two monitors at the same time and have desktop cross-over that would rock! Possible, but it would require use of the VBXE XDL and if we're going to do that on a VBXE machine we might as well write a VBXE graphics driver for the GUI and have a 640x400 interlaced desktop in 16 colours. Sounds like a great Idea ! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gunstar Posted March 9, 2012 Share Posted March 9, 2012 I wonder if it might be possible to have this GUI running on two screens in the case of an Atari with VBXE installed? I'm not up to snuff on what exactly the VBXE does, but if it's possible to have RGB and composite/s-video outputs to two monitors at the same time and have desktop cross-over that would rock! Possible, but it would require use of the VBXE XDL and if we're going to do that on a VBXE machine we might as well write a VBXE graphics driver for the GUI and have a 640x400 interlaced desktop in 16 colours. Sounds like a great Idea ! So then we can do a desktop across two screens, one 320x192 monchrome and one 640x400i with 16 colors. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flashjazzcat Posted March 9, 2012 Author Share Posted March 9, 2012 So then we can do a desktop across two screens, one 320x192 monchrome and one 640x400i with 16 colors. It's 320x200, but I doubt the extra processing would be worthwhile even if it is possible to split the desktop. If I do write a VBXE version (which will please at least one person), I rather think the 640x400i desktop will suffice on its own. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
atarixle Posted March 9, 2012 Share Posted March 9, 2012 I think it's needless to support the VBXE directly, as long the VBXE is fully ANTIC compatible. But I think it's worth to make use of the VBXE anyway, e.g. for image viewers - you even could write an image viewer for basic ANTIC images, but with extra options for manipulating in any way, or show information about the image while the image is shown (which is not always possible on a pure ANTIC machine). So you could show a 256-colors-image (80x96) at half the size, or in full scanlines, and show size, path, and filename of the file. You could make sure, the image is shown in colors, as long the VBXE in ANTIC-mode doesn't show the colors (256-colors images look like grey-scale images on this hardware). In that scenary, I'm talking about the image-viewer as a stand-alone-program, which is called whenever you open an image file (just like in BOSS-X). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flashjazzcat Posted March 9, 2012 Author Share Posted March 9, 2012 Sounds like a sensible approach to picture display, although "some" VBXE support will always beg the question of why the whole system isn't running at 640x400 and drenched in colours. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flashjazzcat Posted March 14, 2012 Author Share Posted March 14, 2012 (edited) Preliminary text clipping demo: http://youtu.be/r3ZP66-ToLM You may need to pause this to see that the left half of the "F" in filename is clipped off, as is one of the numbers on the right hand side of the window. Obviously the scroll bars aren't correctly positioned yet, and I had to bodge the clip routine to get it working - otherwise characters entirely outside of the clipping box aren't even processed at all. This will save a considerable amount of time. Still - this runs nice and quick. The clip routine very efficiently and discreetly creates a 40 byte clipping mask used by every line in the clipping box. It does this every time the application changes the clipping region, signalling to the GUI that the clipping mask must be rebuilt. The mask seems to be the most efficient way of eliminating unnecessary rendering, since bytes in the foreground mask with all bits set to 0 mean the current byte of the line can be completely skipped. So even when pixel-precision horizontal clipping isn't required (as is the case with window client areas, which always line up on bytes), the bytes in the clipping mask still tell the renderer whether or not the current byte needs to be written to the screen. This project is making BIG use of masks. Edited March 14, 2012 by flashjazzcat 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
w1k Posted March 14, 2012 Share Posted March 14, 2012 "this video is private" :/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flashjazzcat Posted March 14, 2012 Author Share Posted March 14, 2012 "this video is private" :/ Thanks - I wanted "unlisted" but Windows Movie Maker only offered public or private. Fixed now. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JamesD Posted March 15, 2012 Share Posted March 15, 2012 I'm not seeing a video at all. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+MrFish Posted March 15, 2012 Share Posted March 15, 2012 I'm not seeing a video at all. Maybe Jon over-did it with the clipping and the video itself got clipped. Seriously though, I can see it fine here. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JamesD Posted March 15, 2012 Share Posted March 15, 2012 Well, not sure what was up but it's there now. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
atarixle Posted March 15, 2012 Share Posted March 15, 2012 idk what's wrong with youtube, I switched to HTML5 test, but they still prompt me to install Flash (all codecs are supported) :/ but I wont install Flash on my lil Netbook. anyway, I don't think, monochrome interlaced will look so great. it'll be flickering a lot. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rybags Posted March 15, 2012 Share Posted March 15, 2012 They've "upgraded" it again. You can hover over the slider and get a preview frame of what's at that point. Here's hoping they didn't break too much like they usually do every time they change something. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flashjazzcat Posted March 15, 2012 Author Share Posted March 15, 2012 (edited) anyway, I don't think, monochrome interlaced will look so great. it'll be flickering a lot. It wouldn't be monochrome, since I was speculatively (and somewhat distantly) referring to VBXE's 16 colour 640x200 mode with a 400 line interlace - and Rybags' VBXE interlace is pretty easy on the eyes on all the displays I tested it with. I have no intention of using interlaced modes with Antic hi-res, since I don't regard 320x400 as an especially useful resolution (for our purposes, at least), and it would eat RAM we don't have. Anyway - the clipping will be more interesting when we're using large fonts or icons. What's pleasing is that the method employed is almost "free" once the mask is set up. I'm gearing up to a demo in the next few days which has two movable, overlapping windows full of icons which can be scolled across with the scroll bars. I think that will give us a definitive picture of the performance of the finished system. Edited March 15, 2012 by flashjazzcat 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flashjazzcat Posted March 16, 2012 Author Share Posted March 16, 2012 (edited) Just got the new clipping system working properly: I'll go into detail about how it works later (it's not complicated but it's rather difficult to visualize), but it's almost free and is so efficient and the impact so slight on the rendering loops I've done away with the special clipped text rendering routine altogether. It handles off-screen rendering so windows which extend off the edge of the desktop will be no problem at all. Just the odd glitch (spot the stray pixel) to work out. Edited March 16, 2012 by flashjazzcat 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fibrewire Posted March 18, 2012 Share Posted March 18, 2012 I was able to wipe that stray pixel off my screen with bug spray Here's to eagerly awating a WIP video! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flashjazzcat Posted March 18, 2012 Author Share Posted March 18, 2012 No need for bug-spray now: errant pixel vanished as soon as typo in source code was fixed. It's partially off-screen windows today, and in a short while an XEX demo with content in multiple windows. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flashjazzcat Posted March 18, 2012 Author Share Posted March 18, 2012 Tested four open windows just for kicks after debugging the window manager: Will be a tad faster when the front window is being blitted. Should have icons in all windows and said windows extending off desktop in a few days. 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Stephen Posted March 18, 2012 Share Posted March 18, 2012 Just wow! That's one of the coolest things I've seen the little A8 do so far. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
31336haxx0r Posted March 18, 2012 Share Posted March 18, 2012 It's about as fast or slow as any 386 running Windoze 3.x. Just pure awesomeness! 8-) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JamesD Posted March 19, 2012 Share Posted March 19, 2012 I'm not sure I'd say it's as fast as a 386 running Windows (386sx maybe), but it's more than fast enough to be usable. Very cool! Too bad this wasn't around in the '80s. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
potatohead Posted March 19, 2012 Share Posted March 19, 2012 I am seriously impressed. This project is a lot of fun to watch. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kogden Posted March 19, 2012 Share Posted March 19, 2012 (edited) It's about as fast or slow as any 386 running Windoze 3.x. Just pure awesomeness! 8-) That's a bit of a stretch..... my old 386DX/40 w/ SVGA was pretty badass for the day actually. Betcha it might spank an XT running Win3.0 however. Now THAT would be entertainment. And even a fair fight. Edited March 19, 2012 by kogden Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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