giflib for fc5

[Warren Togami]

Michael A. Peters wrote:
> Can we replace libungif with giflib in fc5?
> 
> The LZW patent is dead, Unisys specifically says so on their website.
> 
> The current version of gd shipping with Fedora now supports gif.
> The cvs version of gnuplot now supports the gif terminal type again
> using the gd library.
> The libtiff library in fc4 now has lzw patched back in.
> 
> I've been using giflib on my system since fc3 (removing libungif and
> installing giflib in its place, with the shared library symlinks going
> the other way) and there are absolutely no issues.
> 
> I'll file a bugzilla on libungif for it, I think I might have already in
> the past - but are there any other reasons anyone can think of for not
> going with giflib?
> 
> giflib is available from same sourceforge location as libungif and being
> maintained in parallel with libungif. I'm guessing it is only a matter
> of time before libungif disappears.
> 

http://sourceforge.net/projects/libungif
"A library for reading and writing gif images. The save functionality 
uses an uncompressed gif algorithm to avoid the Unisys LZW patent. This 
library is based on Eric Raymond's giflib and implements a superset of 
that library's API. "

This and other hits on Google indicate that libungif has some exported 
functions that giflib lacks.  Are you sure this is a perfectly safe 
drop-in replacement?  There are not a whole lot of details on this website.

Warren Togami
wtogami at redhat.com