Re: [AD] Possible new features for Allegro?

["Chris La Mantia" <celamantia@xxxxxxxxxx>]

> - more bitmap file format support including JPEG, GIF(though it's a
> proprietary format, it's allowed to load it), etc.

This has come up about a dozen times in the last year.  The sole purpose of
a bitmap loader is to get an image into Allegro's BITMAP or SPRITE format.
Allegro already supports more than enough image types for a game developer,
since in a finished game the images are usually compiled into a datafile
rather than shipped as individual images.  In addition, the license for JPEG
and GIF code make them incompatible with Allegro's giftware license.

Loaders for alternative image formats should remain as add-ons.

HOWEVER... where we can improve Allegro along these lines is to support a
compressed BITMAP that supports a more aggressive compression than
RLE_SPRITEs.  Obviously, these would be slower than RLE-SPRITES; they would
primarily be used for background images that are only drawn at the beginning
of a level or game, where speed is less critical.  It would be nice if we
could support both lossless and lossy compression, and to compress a
previously uncompressed bitmap, such as one generated on the fly.

Since we're already using LZSS code in the file compression and
decompression routines, perhaps these could be brought into play for
lossless compression.

--Chris