__     ____
              _  ______/ /__  / __/___ ___  ____ _____
             | |/_/ __  / _ \/ /_/ __ `__ \/ __ `/ __ \
            _>  </ /_/ /  __/ __/ / / / / / /_/ / /_/ /
           /_/|_|\__,_/\___/_/ /_/ /_/ /_/\__,_/ .___/  V1.3
                                              /_/
            -- the return of the standard colormap ? --
           


In the search of THE solution for colorproblems on pseudocolor X-Servers
I just stepped over these rarely used standard colormaps again. I got some
new ideas how to (ab)use this mechanism and wrote a tiny tool, that is in
first place a tool to install standard colormaps (like xstdcmap).

The original of the tool (13k) is available as:
   ftp.x.org:/contrib/utilities/xdefmap-1.3.tgz



ADDITIONAL FEATURES

o  The size of the Standard-Colormaps can be arbitrarily defined,
      e.g. one could define a 32 color gray ramp with:   xdefmap -gray 32
      or a 4x4x4 rgb color cube (as default cmap) with:  xdefmap -default 4

o  The maps are allocated as read-only pixels(!) in the standard-colormap.
   In that way there won't be any colormap-switching and the colors can
   even be used by other applications. Since standard colormaps have to
   consist of successive pixels, of the colors (at least 1 for black
   or white) have to be allocated read/write :-(

o  XCMSDB files with Aliasnames can be created depending on the installed
   colormaps. (The ultimate database could be the transformation of the
   whole rgb.txt file to map the all named colors into a standard colormap)

o  ppm-files (to be used as mapfiles in the pnmquant-utility) can be created,
   that can be used to convert images exactly to the installed colormaps
   or even all available shared colors.
   
o  There are some information options like: showing the whole colormap,
   querying information about the installed maps and about the allocated pixels.


RESTRICTIONS

o   The program is actually a hack and works only on color displays with a
    PSEUDOCOLOR-default map with 256 entries (since these are the displays
    where the real problems exist...)

o   The main idea was NOT to have any colormap switching on the screen, so
    you can only install maps, that fit into the available entries of the
    default colormap.


FUTURE THOUGHTS

o   Even though the handling for applications is much the same than using
    different visuals, standard colormaps are rarely used. I hope this could
    be changed, since this tool could be a way to setup the colors of
    several graphic applications in a unique way (and still have some pixels
    left for other stuff)

o   This tool is only a side product of my current interests (and I actually
    wouldn't spent more time than necessary on it). Anyway, please send me
    your opinion about the tool and your ideas as soon as possible.
    Can it really be useful or is it just a neat hack?

==> By the way, the ImageMagick-package fully supports standard-colormaps,
    so you can play a bit with that package to get an impression of the
    possibilities of this program.


COMMENTS

o   are very welcome if you send them to:     Helmut.Hoenig@hub.de


 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------

   __ __    __           __   
  / // /__ / /_ _  __ __/ /_             WANNA PLAY SOME POOL?
 / _  / -_) /  ' \/ // / __/   -> get flying from ftp.x.org or elsewhere
/_//_/\__/_/_/_/_/\_,_/\__/   
e-mail: Helmut.Hoenig@hub.de