fast HAM8 conversion ?

[Thorham]

Originally Posted by meynaf

The actual version should be pretty stable, it may serve this purpose if you wish.

Well, I'll just download the latest version. No harm in replacing visages ugly renderings!

Originally Posted by meynaf

That's wholly different for me. I never comment code in English. This helps me to quickly distinguish my own comments from the original ones when I touch existing code. I also feel French is more precise than English.

When you use other peoples source code, that is indeed handy. But French more precise than English? Why do you feel that? I know it's off topic, but I'm very interested in written language (Japanese, anyone?).

Originally Posted by meynaf

Then again, it may just be because English is dominant and I don't like dominant things

Oh, come on, man

Originally Posted by meynaf

Please report anything that went wrong. I'm confident in the program not crashing, but it may falsely reject some images.

If its french warnings about the current file annoy you (it's quite talkative, any unsupported little thing such as an unknown marker will be reported), just add "quiet" to the command line to make it shut up.

Also, if you have some viewers I didn't test, you can benchmark them too.

No problem. The French warnings are of course no problem, and I can forward those to you, in case something does go wrong. Now all I need is a good benchmarking program, maybe aminet has something?

[meynaf]

Originally Posted by Thorham

Well, I'll just download the latest version. No harm in replacing visages ugly renderings!

Sure, even though it will be hard beating it in speed (for jpeg only that is, the others are already much faster).

Originally Posted by Thorham

When you use other peoples source code, that is indeed handy. But French more precise than English? Why do you feel that? I know it's off topic, but I'm very interested in written language (Japanese, anyone?).

[ off-topic mode on ]
Yes, more precise. In French you say things in order instead of making a mess in trying to say them all at once like in English or Deutsch.
It's very easy to make something ambiguous in English, just put several words together and you're done.
I can't develop much more, if you feel like learning a beautiful, poetic tongue, then don't hesitate. And as a bonus you'll understand my comments

I heard Japanese is regular and logical (yet a pain to learn ), but, when I heard japanese people talking together, it sounded awful to me.
[ off-topic mode off ]

Originally Posted by Thorham

Oh, come on, man

Ok ok

Originally Posted by Thorham

No problem. The French warnings are of course no problem, and I can forward those to you, in case something does go wrong. Now all I need is a good benchmarking program, maybe aminet has something?

I dunno for Aminet, that's why I did mine. You already have it, it's the one used to benchmark the ham8 rendering.

[Thorham]

Originally Posted by meynaf

Sure, even though it will be hard beating it in speed (for jpeg only that is, the others are already much faster).

Maybe you could sacrifice more quality in both the ham renderer and jpeg decoder for more speed in quick mode.

Originally Posted by meynaf

[ off-topic mode on ]
Yes, more precise. In French you say things in order instead of making a mess in trying to say them all at once like in English or Deutsch.
It's very easy to make something ambiguous in English, just put several words together and you're done.
I can't develop much more, if you feel like learning a beautiful, poetic tongue, then don't hesitate. And as a bonus you'll understand my comments

I heard Japanese is regular and logical (yet a pain to learn ), but, when I heard japanese people talking together, it sounded awful to me.
[ off-topic mode off ]

Never thought of that. Japanese is indeed quite regular. But the writing system is very time consuming to master, mostly because of the 1945 Chinese characters (kanji) you have to know. Learning the language itself is probably not a lot harder than learning French, although it will be somewhat harder because it isn't very close to the languages we speak here.

Originally Posted by meynaf

I dunno for Aminet, that's why I did mine. You already have it, it's the one used to benchmark the ham8 rendering.

Oh, I didn't know it would work for other programs, too. Good to know that.

[meynaf]

Originally Posted by Thorham

Maybe you could sacrifice more quality in both the ham renderer and jpeg decoder for more speed in quick mode.

A real quick mode (which reaches the speed of sjfif) needs more than a little sacrifice of quality...
However I admit the quick mode isn't in my urgent todolist.
And I'm already faster than Visage if displaying a grayscale jpeg

What I'd prefer to do for more speed is the preloading of images, like fastview does.
After, of course, finishing up that jpeg codec.

Originally Posted by Thorham

Never thought of that. Japanese is indeed quite regular. But the writing system is very time consuming to master, mostly because of the 1945 Chinese characters (kanji) you have to know. Learning the language itself is probably not a lot harder than learning French, although it will be somewhat harder because it isn't very close to the languages we speak here.

I don't know much in that area. Heard the worse language to learn was Chinese. For me learning French was very easy
But apart from English, I only have some notions of German, nothing else.
I can say I know a lot more in computer languages than in human languages

Originally Posted by Thorham

Oh, I didn't know it would work for other programs, too. Good to know that.

Since it's made for viewers, any program which displays a picture from top to bottom is ok.
Which reminds me I couldn't benchmark Visage when displaying a progressive jpeg because it doesn't display it at once and can't be told to do so.

[Thorham]

Originally Posted by meynaf

A real quick mode (which reaches the speed of sjfif) needs more than a little sacrifice of quality...
However I admit the quick mode isn't in my urgent todolist.
And I'm already faster than Visage if displaying a grayscale jpeg

What I'd prefer to do for more speed is the preloading of images, like fastview does.
After, of course, finishing up that jpeg codec.

Yes, it would probably require you to do something to the idct code. And I just don't see what. And if you're already faster than Visage for gray scale, than you're ceirtainly going in the right direction. Decoding an image in the background while you're viewing one seems odd to me, though, how are you going to know which image to load? Or am I not getting something again

Originally Posted by meynaf

I don't know much in that area. Heard the worse language to learn was Chinese. For me learning French was very easy
But apart from English, I only have some notions of German, nothing else.
I can say I know a lot more in computer languages than in human languages

I don't know more than two languages either. Chinese is certainly not something I would wan't to waste my time on. Their writing system just plain sucks, it's crazy.

Originally Posted by meynaf

Since it's made for viewers, any program which displays a picture from top to bottom is ok.
Which reminds me I couldn't benchmark Visage when displaying a progressive jpeg because it doesn't display it at once and can't be told to do so.

What I was wondering is how on earth do you detect this? Not that I've given it much thought, but it doesn't seem to easy what this program does.

[meynaf]

Originally Posted by Thorham

Yes, it would probably require you to do something to the idct code. And I just don't see what. And if you're already faster than Visage for gray scale, than you're ceirtainly going in the right direction.

The direction for now is the huffman decoding. I started a little something this week-end. This part isn't very complex by itself, but it's more complicated than should be...

Did you compare the actual speed with the old one and/or visage itself ?

Originally Posted by Thorham

Decoding an image in the background while you're viewing one seems odd to me, though, how are you going to know which image to load? Or am I not getting something again

Ever heard of pattern-matching ?

Originally Posted by Thorham

I don't know more than two languages either. Chinese is certainly not something I would wan't to waste my time on. Their writing system just plain sucks, it's crazy.

Their writing system looks crazy to us, but they may well think the same about ours
And remember : the more Chinese there are, the less rice there is

Originally Posted by Thorham

What I was wondering is how on earth do you detect this? Not that I've given it much thought, but it doesn't seem to easy what this program does.

I don't detect anything and the benchmark program stops at the first pass... giving a bogus result as you might expect.
However, it's easy to see that an image is progressive when visage displays it. But maybe you never tried to display a progressive jpeg so this won't sound a bell for you.

[Thorham]

Originally Posted by meynaf

The direction for now is the huffman decoding. I started a little something this week-end. This part isn't very complex by itself, but it's more complicated than should be...

Is it an implementations issue or is the needed method more complex than it should be?

Originally Posted by meynaf

Did you compare the actual speed with the old one and/or visage itself ?

Here's the results (for an 800x600 24 bit non-progressive jpeg):

V (the one included in the storm project zip):408 frames
V (the first version I ever had):686 frames
FastView:444 frames
Visage:365 frames
FastJpeg:555 frames

I must say you've done a great job at optimizing your viewer Only Visage still has to be beaten.

Originally Posted by meynaf

Ever heard of pattern-matching ?

Anyway, I do like the pre-loading idea. Should really be implemented, as it could work a blast on the faster machines with more memory.

Originally Posted by meynaf

Their writing system looks crazy to us, but they may well think the same about ours

No, their writing system is very hard, and here's why: They use a large character set (2000+ chars, out of 40000+ chars). Each of those chars has a meaning and a pronunciation. The big problem is that the Chinese use both. That means that characters can be used on their meaning, their pronunciation or both! Compare that to the Japanese writing system: They use 2000+ Chinese chars for their meaning only (mostly), and they have two separate charsets for pronunciation. This is of course much easier since if you see a Chinese char in Japanese text, you really only have to be concerned with it's meaning. Thus the Japanese writing system is just time consuming to learn, while the Chinese system is also quite hard to learn. About the Latin alphabet: I just think they don't want to break with their rich writing system tradition, I don't think they see it as strange (it's actually in use for simplified Chinese, if I'm not mistaken).

Originally Posted by meynaf

I don't detect anything and the benchmark program stops at the first pass... giving a bogus result as you might expect.
However, it's easy to see that an image is progressive when visage displays it. But maybe you never tried to display a progressive jpeg so this won't sound a bell for you.

That's not what I meant. How do you detect the viewer has written the complete image for non-progressive jpegs, or say gifs? And I've seen progressive jpegs. Currently I only have one on the miggy, and since these things suck anyway, I usually convert them on the peecee.

[meynaf]

Originally Posted by Thorham

Is it an implementations issue or is the needed method more complex than it should be?

Both.

The main trick with huffman codes is that you don't know how many bits a code will be before having it decoded.
In a jpeg stream, you can't just read bits in advance because you may hit a marker and this forbids you to try to read past it.

But don't worry, I'll handle it

Originally Posted by Thorham

Here's the results (for an 800x600 24 bit non-progressive jpeg):

V (the one included in the storm project zip):408 frames
V (the first version I ever had):686 frames
FastView:444 frames
Visage:365 frames
FastJpeg:555 frames

I must say you've done a great job at optimizing your viewer Only Visage still has to be beaten.

Visage gets its speed from its (ugly but fast) rendering. Yet I think I still can beat it while retaining my actual quality. I don't know if it can be beaten on every image, though.

EDIT: which image did you use ? With lulu.jpg (800x600 too) I don't get the same results.

Originally Posted by Thorham

Anyway, I do like the pre-loading idea. Should really be implemented, as it could work a blast on the faster machines with more memory.

Yeah, with this you'll be able to quickly browse your huge collection of xxx pics

Originally Posted by Thorham

No, their writing system is very hard, and here's why: They use a large character set (2000+ chars, out of 40000+ chars). Each of those chars has a meaning and a pronunciation. The big problem is that the Chinese use both. That means that characters can be used on their meaning, their pronunciation or both! Compare that to the Japanese writing system: They use 2000+ Chinese chars for their meaning only (mostly), and they have two separate charsets for pronunciation. This is of course much easier since if you see a Chinese char in Japanese text, you really only have to be concerned with it's meaning. Thus the Japanese writing system is just time consuming to learn, while the Chinese system is also quite hard to learn. About the Latin alphabet: I just think they don't want to break with their rich writing system tradition, I don't think they see it as strange (it's actually in use for simplified Chinese, if I'm not mistaken).

Ouch... what can I say...
I won't ever attempt to learn those...

Originally Posted by Thorham

That's not what I meant. How do you detect the viewer has written the complete image for non-progressive jpegs, or say gifs? And I've seen progressive jpegs. Currently I only have one on the miggy, and since these things suck anyway, I usually convert them on the peecee.

OpenScreen() / OpenScreenTagList() are patched, then I run the program.
Once the screen is opened, I get its bitmap and at each vblank I look if its bottom-right area is still zeroed or not. On some images you have to peek a different area, but I don't have any better method.

About the progressive jpegs, jpegtran does the conversion on the Miggy too, without any loss.

[Thorham]

Originally Posted by meynaf

Both.

The main trick with huffman codes is that you don't know how many bits a code will be before having it decoded.
In a jpeg stream, you can't just read bits in advance because you may hit a marker and this forbids you to try to read past it.

But don't worry, I'll handle it

Ok, than I won't worry. Still, it shouldn't be that hard to write.

Originally Posted by meynaf

Visage gets its speed from its (ugly but fast) rendering. Yet I think I still can beat it while retaining my actual quality. I don't know if it can be beaten on every image, though.

If you can beat visage's speed at a higher quality, than that's ace! But are you sure about that? It seems like the only 'heavy' code left is the huffman decoding...

Originally Posted by meynaf

EDIT: which image did you use ? With lulu.jpg (800x600 too) I don't get the same results.

It's one of the three FinalFantasy 10 pictures of which lulu.jpg is one. The picture has Yuna in it. One of the reasons why the results aren't the same is that I think my blizzards ram is set to 70ns, while it should be at 60ns. Since I'm using blizzards kickstart remapping and didn't know which jumper it was, I had to try both jumpers, and I probably broke one. And I just lost the other one. Easy to fix, but not that important. It's just a pity the jumpers are smaller than normal jumpers.

Originally Posted by meynaf

Yeah, with this you'll be able to quickly browse your huge collection of xxx pics

Hmm, I used to have those on my pc, until I got tired of them all and wiped them of the hd

Originally Posted by meynaf

Ouch... what can I say...
I won't ever attempt to learn those...

Not worth it if you don't have a real use for them anyway. Although I would love to know Japanese, including it's writing system, for some bizarre reason.

Originally Posted by meynaf

OpenScreen() / OpenScreenTagList() are patched, then I run the program.
Once the screen is opened, I get its bitmap and at each vblank I look if its bottom-right area is still zeroed or not. On some images you have to peek a different area, but I don't have any better method.

Now I understand. I have to say that I know next to nothing about system programming. Shame really.

Originally Posted by meynaf

About the progressive jpegs, jpegtran does the conversion on the Miggy too, without any loss.

I wonder what pc software can do this, since it's a lot faster than my miggy. Still, I'll give that program a look, because in the past, those progressive jpegs used to drive me bonkers.

[meynaf]

Originally Posted by Thorham

Ok, than I won't worry. Still, it shouldn't be that hard to write.

It's not only a matter of writing. It's also a matter of choosing the fastest method and implementing it in an optimized manner.
Just a little bit more complex than the other parts

Originally Posted by Thorham

If you can beat visage's speed at a higher quality, than that's ace! But are you sure about that? It seems like the only 'heavy' code left is the huffman decoding...

The huffman decoding appeared relatively big to me. Such decoding is bloody slow in compiled code because C just can't do it in a simple manner.
Maybe it'll be enough.
Yet, the difference isn't the same on every picture.

Originally Posted by Thorham

It's one of the three FinalFantasy 10 pictures of which lulu.jpg is one. The picture has Yuna in it. One of the reasons why the results aren't the same is that I think my blizzards ram is set to 70ns, while it should be at 60ns. Since I'm using blizzards kickstart remapping and didn't know which jumper it was, I had to try both jumpers, and I probably broke one. And I just lost the other one. Easy to fix, but not that important. It's just a pity the jumpers are smaller than normal jumpers.

So that's Yuna. I'll try this one. Must beat that Visage program.

Anyway I suggest you benchmark that lulu.jpg image and tell me what you think of the result. It should be quite different even on the same machine.

Originally Posted by Thorham

Hmm, I used to have those on my pc, until I got tired of them all and wiped them of the hd

That's what they all say

Originally Posted by Thorham

Not worth it if you don't have a real use for them anyway. Although I would love to know Japanese, including it's writing system, for some bizarre reason.

For some really bizarre reason then

Originally Posted by Thorham

Now I understand. I have to say that I know next to nothing about system programming. Shame really.

Hardware poking is much more fun
(even though I still prefer using my own library)

Originally Posted by Thorham

I wonder what pc software can do this, since it's a lot faster than my miggy. Still, I'll give that program a look, because in the past, those progressive jpegs used to drive me bonkers.

Since jpegtran is part of the tools given with the jpeg library, there has to be a pc version.
If you want a faster version you can also try uae with jit activated.

[Thorham]

Originally Posted by meynaf

It's not only a matter of writing. It's also a matter of choosing the fastest method and implementing it in an optimized manner.
Just a little bit more complex than the other parts

I'm looking forward to see what you can make of it.

Originally Posted by meynaf

The huffman decoding appeared relatively big to me. Such decoding is bloody slow in compiled code because C just can't do it in a simple manner.
Maybe it'll be enough.
Yet, the difference isn't the same on every picture.

Yeah, I've seen that code. It shouldn't be too hard to beat some c code And I really wouldn't be surprised if it's enough.

Originally Posted by meynaf

So that's Yuna. I'll try this one. Must beat that Visage program.

Anyway I suggest you benchmark that lulu.jpg image and tell me what you think of the result. It should be quite different even on the same machine.

Ok, here are the results:

V:490
Old V:766
FastView:615
Visage:534
FastJpeg:665

Seems like V beats Visage for Lulu.jpg! If you like, I can also benchmark with the image that has Riku in it. Just let me know.

Originally Posted by meynaf

That's what they all say

What? You don't believe me However, I'll probably end up downloading a new collection, you know how it goes

Originally Posted by meynaf

For some really bizarre reason then

It's just an interest.

Originally Posted by meynaf

Hardware poking is much more fun
(even though I still prefer using my own library)

You got that right! Hardware coding is just the coolest. Unless you're using VisualBasic .net, of course

Originally Posted by meynaf

Since jpegtran is part of the tools given with the jpeg library, there has to be a pc version.
If you want a faster version you can also try uae with jit activated.

Great! I used to just decode them, and than re-encode them. Needless to say, that sucks. Thanks for the info

[meynaf]

Originally Posted by Thorham

Yeah, I've seen that code. It shouldn't be too hard to beat some c code And I really wouldn't be surprised if it's enough.

Even if it's not enough to totally beat Visage out in speed, it would be satisfying anyway. After all, Visage doesn't decode faster, it's only faster because of its quick-n-dirty ham8 renderer.

Originally Posted by Thorham

Ok, here are the results:

V:490
Old V:766
FastView:615
Visage:534
FastJpeg:665

Seems like V beats Visage for Lulu.jpg! If you like, I can also benchmark with the image that has Riku in it. Just let me know.

Sometimes I beat Visage, but not on average (yet).

Well, maybe more benchmarks can wait a little. Say, just wait until I've done the huffman part, so I'm beaten on less files

Originally Posted by Thorham

What? You don't believe me However, I'll probably end up downloading a new collection, you know how it goes

Originally Posted by Thorham

It's just an interest.

Ah, yes. For curiosity.

Originally Posted by Thorham

You got that right! Hardware coding is just the coolest. Unless you're using VisualBasic .net, of course

I'm using this vbnet at work and I don't find it cool.

[Thorham]

Originally Posted by meynaf

Even if it's not enough to totally beat Visage out in speed, it would be satisfying anyway. After all, Visage doesn't decode faster, it's only faster because of its quick-n-dirty ham8 renderer.

Yeah, that's not a lot to worry about. IMO, V is already better than Visage.

Originally Posted by meynaf

Sometimes I beat Visage, but not on average (yet).

Well, maybe more benchmarks can wait a little. Say, just wait until I've done the huffman part, so I'm beaten on less files

No problem. I would sure like to get my hands on that version!

Originally Posted by meynaf

Ah, yes. For curiosity.

Yup. I think the Japanese writing system is very cool. But unless you know Japanese, it's useless, and because of the huge amount of Chinese chars you've got to learn, it's rather a bit too time consuming for my liking.

Originally Posted by meynaf

I'm using this vbnet at work and I don't find it cool.

You mean Visual Basic 2008 Express Edition? That's the one I use. It's pretty cool for gui aplications, and you can get some speed out of it if you write well. Also, it's object orientation is great, and so is the syntax. Or at least it is when compared to c++

[meynaf]

Originally Posted by Thorham

Yeah, that's not a lot to worry about. IMO, V is already better than Visage.

Hopefully it is, but frankly it wasn't that hard

Originally Posted by Thorham

No problem. I would sure like to get my hands on that version!

You'll get your hands on it, as soon as it's done - which will be some time from now, even though I've recently setup an uae so a little bit more things can be done.

Originally Posted by Thorham

Yup. I think the Japanese writing system is very cool. But unless you know Japanese, it's useless, and because of the huge amount of Chinese chars you've got to learn, it's rather a bit too time consuming for my liking.

Cool or not, I'm not gonna try to learn it...

Originally Posted by Thorham

You mean Visual Basic 2008 Express Edition? That's the one I use. It's pretty cool for gui aplications, and you can get some speed out of it if you write well. Also, it's object orientation is great, and so is the syntax. Or at least it is when compared to c++

No, I meant that buggy vb.net 2003 (with ms sourcesafe to just make things worse).

[Thorham]

Originally Posted by meynaf

Hopefully it is, but frankly it wasn't that hard

It probably is, seeing how it already beats Visage.

Originally Posted by meynaf

You'll get your hands on it, as soon as it's done - which will be some time from now, even though I've recently setup an uae so a little bit more things can be done.

WinUae is certainly handy for when you don't have access to your miggy, however, doing speed tests on it is quite useless, unfortunately. Can't you just take your miggy with you to the place you stay during the week, and hook it up to a tv, or something? You don't need very good picture quality for coding. Of course, when your setup is similar to mine, where theres a flat cable coming out of the side of the miggy, and you need two power supplies than I guess it would be a little hard

Originally Posted by meynaf

Cool or not, I'm not gonna try to learn it...

What a shame. You could've tried the dictionary program I'm writing in VB 2008 Express...

Originally Posted by meunaf

No, I meant that buggy vb.net 2003 (with ms sourcesafe to just make things worse).

It must suck to have to use this software for work. I remember having a free version of it, and upgrading to 2005 Express as soon as I could get my hands on it. Why don't they just upgrade? Also, if all you use it for is to write .net programs, why not use the express version? Or is that a stupid question? Let me guess...

[meynaf]

Originally Posted by Thorham

It probably is, seeing how it already beats Visage.

Try a grayscale jpeg and see the humiliation at work
And there's more to come !

Originally Posted by Thorham

WinUae is certainly handy for when you don't have access to your miggy, however, doing speed tests on it is quite useless, unfortunately. Can't you just take your miggy with you to the place you stay during the week, and hook it up to a tv, or something? You don't need very good picture quality for coding. Of course, when your setup is similar to mine, where theres a flat cable coming out of the side of the miggy, and you need two power supplies than I guess it would be a little hard

I've done speed tests on winuae anyway and found it was 30 times faster for single tasks and 50 times less reactive when multitasking. It doesn't give the feeling of the real thing anyway.

Take my miggy with me to the place I stay during the week ? This would mean taking it to my office... No, I don't sleep there but I simply don't have the time to do a thing in the evenings. This ought to change though.

My setup has a flat cable coming out but only one power supply. I'm not about to budge it anyway.

Originally Posted by Thorham

What a shame. You could've tried the dictionary program I'm writing in VB 2008 Express...

Sorry.

Originally Posted by Thorham

It must suck to have to use this software for work. I remember having a free version of it, and upgrading to 2005 Express as soon as I could get my hands on it. Why don't they just upgrade? Also, if all you use it for is to write .net programs, why not use the express version? Or is that a stupid question? Let me guess...

Simply setting up the development environnement and being able to load the project in it requires half a day of fighting

Now why don't they just upgrade ? Maybe because most of the stuff would simply stop working and they don't have the time to fix them. Shame. I'll get out of that dump ASAP.

Can you mix VB and C# with the express version ? I don't think so...

[Thorham]

Originally Posted by meynaf

Try a grayscale jpeg and see the humiliation at work
And there's more to come !

Ok, I'll just make some with IrfanView. And I can't wait to see what's in store!

Originally Posted by meynaf

I've done speed tests on winuae anyway and found it was 30 times faster for single tasks and 50 times less reactive when multitasking. It doesn't give the feeling of the real thing anyway.

Sucks, doesn't it? It's probably the os f***ing around too much. It would be really cool if such an emulator could be used as the os, where the computer simply isn't running any other software than the emulator.

Originally Posted by meynaf

Take my miggy with me to the place I stay during the week ? This would mean taking it to my office... No, I don't sleep there but I simply don't have the time to do a thing in the evenings. This ought to change though.

For your sake, I hope that situation changes, too.

Originally Posted by meynaf

My setup has a flat cable coming out but only one power supply. I'm not about to budge it anyway.

Cool. I'm going to have to adapt my atx power supply one of these days, so I can get rid of that bulky old a500 power unit. Should be easy enough. It's just that the thing has a very loud fan, so I'm probably going to buy a new one, and mod it immediately

Originally Posted by meynaf

Sorry.

Apologies accepted

Originally Posted by meynaf

Simply setting up the development environnement and being able to load the project in it requires half a day of fighting

Yuk, that sucks. In my case, it's just a matter of installing vb express. The old projects can than be converted when you load them up, and they work right away.

Originally Posted by meynaf

Now why don't they just upgrade ? Maybe because most of the stuff would simply stop working and they don't have the time to fix them. Shame. I'll get out of that dump ASAP.

Are the newer versions of Visual Studio that incompatible? Good to know. I'll just stick to the free versions (not that I would like to spend 300 bucks on a program anyway).

Originally Posted by meynaf

Can you mix VB and C# with the express version ? I don't think so...

No, you can't. But what do you need that for anyway?

[meynaf]

Originally Posted by Thorham

Ok, I'll just make some with IrfanView. And I can't wait to see what's in store!

There's not much in store yet, but that damn c code will be dropped one day or another. I have an asm-only jpeg.s which already parses markers.

Originally Posted by Thorham

Sucks, doesn't it? It's probably the os f***ing around too much. It would be really cool if such an emulator could be used as the os, where the computer simply isn't running any other software than the emulator.

It would be really cool but it simply can't be done. Remember : we're on a peecee, where you don't know a thing about what sort of hardware is there. So the os is needed for hardware abstraction layers. Yet another reason why I like the miggy

Originally Posted by Thorham

For your sake, I hope that situation changes, too.

Thanks. A change here just means quitting my job though (and this is gonna happen soon !).

Originally Posted by Thorham

Cool. I'm going to have to adapt my atx power supply one of these days, so I can get rid of that bulky old a500 power unit. Should be easy enough. It's just that the thing has a very loud fan, so I'm probably going to buy a new one, and mod it immediately

Mine is an old AT and is really noisy but I wouldn't dare to try to mod another one. I've got two left hands when it comes to soldering
(not to mention I don't have the required hardware anyway)

Originally Posted by Thorham

Apologies accepted

Sorry, yes, but no regrets. I once heard japanese people talking and I didn't like the way it sounded. Just monotonic, incomprehensible sounds to me...

Originally Posted by Thorham

Yuk, that sucks. In my case, it's just a matter of installing vb express. The old projects can than be converted when you load them up, and they work right away.

For win forms things are usually easy. But did you try web forms ?

Originally Posted by Thorham

Are the newer versions of Visual Studio that incompatible? Good to know. I'll just stick to the free versions (not that I would like to spend 300 bucks on a program anyway).

They're probably not that incompatible if you code correctly
(and 300 bucks are way too much for such a cockroach nest IMO)

Originally Posted by Thorham

No, you can't. But what do you need that for anyway?

For using existing components which may be written in either languages. A little too much code copy-paste I guess

Hmm I've just thought about this... Maybe we should continue this discussion here :
http://eab.abime.net/showthread.php?t=33576
as there's not much left to say about the ham8 renderer now...