Re: OT: xfs vs. freetype

[Andre Costa <acosta ar microlink com br>]

Hi Mike, thks for replying. Some additional comments below:

On Fri, 2 May 2003 05:03:36 -0400 (EDT)
"Mike A. Harris" <mharris www linux org uk> wrote:

> >1. what's the relationship between xfs and freetype?
> 
> freetype is a font rasterization library.  xfs is an X11 font 
> server which uses freetype to rasterize fonts.

My question has been misleading, so maybe if I explain the rationale
behind it, you will understand what I was wanting to know: I've been
watching freetype's ML, and a new version 2.1.4 has been released a
couple of weeks ago. I though about upgrading mine (RH 8.0 stock 2.1.3)
but then I thought: "if xfs doesn't use it, this would be pointless".
How far am I from the truth? I tried ldd on xfs, and found out this:

[root shadow root]# ldd `type -p xfs`
        libXfont.so.1 => /usr/X11R6/lib/libXfont.so.1 (0x40023000)
        libm.so.6 => /lib/i686/libm.so.6 (0x400a7000)
        libz.so.1 => /usr/lib/libz.so.1 (0x400c9000)
        libc.so.6 => /lib/i686/libc.so.6 (0x42000000)
        /lib/ld-linux.so.2 => /lib/ld-linux.so.2 (0x40000000)

Freetype's libs don't appear on the list above. So, xfs might have been
statically linked to them, and in this case upgrading freetype would
really be pointless, is that right? 

> >2. what's the relationship between freetype X11 module and Freetype
> >[http://freetype.sourceforge.net/] ?
> 
> The freetype XFree86 module is the X server alternative to using 
> xfs to handle truetype fonts.  the freetype module is also linked 
> to the freetype library.

Got it. I looked around, and it seems that X11's freetype module is
statically linked as well:

[root shadow root]# find /usr/X11R6/ -name '*freetype*' -print
/usr/X11R6/lib/modules/fonts/libfreetype.a

If that is right, upgrading freetype wouldn't affect X11's freetype
module either. Obviously, I am missing something here... Any kind sould
could give me a hand? ;)

> >3. What are the differences/advantages one offers compared to the
> >other?
> 
> They do different things, so it's like comparing apples to 
> oranges.

Thks, Mike. Hopefully, answers to the questions above should be all I
need.

Best,

Andre

-- 
Andre Oliveira da Costa