[GSoC 2023] Improving Icon-O-Matic Final Report

Blog post by Zardshard on Fri, 2023-08-18 11:21

What is Icon-O-Matic? There’s a good chance that not everyone reading this article will know what Icon-O-Matic is, so I’ll start by explaining what it is. Icon-O-Matic is a vector graphics editing program like Illustrator or Inkscape. It is specifically made to work with Haiku’s custom HVIF vector graphics format. This format is similar to the SVG format, except optimized to be much, much smaller. The blog post “500 Byte Images: The Haiku Vector Icon Format” provides a more in-depth discussion for those interested.

[GSOC 2023] Progress on perspective transformation

Blog post by Zardshard on Mon, 2023-06-19 12:56

While the change request to add reference images was being reviewed, I started working on ticket #18415, which suggests adding shear and perspective transformations. I decided to implement the perspective transformation since I still need to figure out which way I’m going to implement the shear transformation. Hopefully the experience in implementing the perspective transformation will give me information that will help me decide how to implement the shear transformation.

[GSoC 2023] Next up: Add reference images

Blog post by Zardshard on Thu, 2023-06-01 08:39

I have fixed three memory leaks. Before, leak_analyser.sh found 75 leaks from simply opening and closing Icon-O-Matic. It now reports only 27. I am now planning to implement a new shape type called “reference images”. This implements ticket #2748. As discussed in the ticket, having a reference image in the background greatly assists in vectorizing it. Reference images are just for reference. They will not be exported to the final HVIF file.

[GSoC 2023] First course of action: fix memory leaks

Blog post by Zardshard on Mon, 2023-05-29 09:03

The coding period has started today! In the last blog post related to GSOC, I said “Here are the plans that I currently have. As with all plans, they are subject to change.” They did indeed change since I found a tool to find memory leaks. Before I was accepted into GSOC, I had been thinking about porting AddressSanitizer to Haiku to find memory leaks. I decided against it. During the community bonding period, I found a file called leak_analyser.

How to find memory leaks

Blog post by Zardshard on Tue, 2023-05-23 10:44

In 2010-2011, mmlr created a new memory allocator: the guarded heap memory allocator. This allocator helps detect various bugs such as writing past the end of allocated memory, reading uninitialized memory, and freeing freed memory. These uses are detailed in “Using malloc_debug to Find Memory Related Bugs”. Later, in 2015, mmlr had a new project: updating the memory allocator to be able to report memory leaks. To use this feature, start by loading libroot_debug.

The Icon Sets Proposed in the Icon Contest

Blog post by Zardshard on Thu, 2023-05-11 10:01

In 2006, an contest was held to create an original icon set for Haiku to replace the BeOS R5 icons. With the passage of time, much of the content surrounding the event has rotted away, including images of the proposed icon sets. Luckily, the Internet Archive has backups! The Stipi icon set won, with Honey, zuMi and Mc Clintock trailing close behind. 575 Alba Deborah Dropline Neu Garum Honey Ikonki jdawin Kabuto Klapaucius Mc Clintock Miqlas Ponkan Stippi Tango zuMi Sources: Haiku icon set contest idea

[GSoC 2023] Plans for improving Icon-O-Matic

Blog post by Zardshard on Fri, 2023-05-05 14:07

Icon-O-Matic is the editor for HVIF files, the format that Haiku’s icons are in. It’s a relatively simple but impressive aplication. It does have room for improvement, however. There are three things I am planning to do during GSoC: fix bugs, refactor the code, and improve the UI. There is a list of known bugs that Icon-O-Matic has over on Trac. You can help, too, by reporting bugs in Icon-O-Matic over there.