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digitalmars.D - C Wrapper FYI: libpng, libsane, and libharu

reply Chad Joan <chadjoan gmail.com> writes:
I just spent a few days creating a wrapper for libpng.  It isn't 
perfect, but I figured someone might want to know about this code.  I 
also made libsane and libharu wrappers earlier.

libpng was the real pain of all of these, so I hope this saves someone 
about 3 days of work.

The wrappers are currently housed in my (hobby) scanning automation project:
https://github.com/chadjoan/autoscan/tree/master/src

The libpng wrapper converts the setjmp/longjmp error handling of the 
libpng C API into thrown exceptions in D code.  It does this using C 
code so that the C compiler can get the setjmp right for sure, and also 
allows the C compiler to decipher the versioning macro maze and prevent 
linking breakage by pushing missing function detection into runtime. 
This requires generating a bunch of code.

The libsane wrapper (as in Scanner Access Now Easy) is much simpler.  It 
also features some tests that can be compiled (on both C and D sides) to 
make sure that the type sizes and struct layouts agree on your system. 
Furthermore, a work-in-progress higher level abstraction for sane 
(sane/abstraction.d) provides a Range-based interface for some of sane's 
operations (the Range stuff is not API-stable at all, use at your own risk).

The libharu wrapper isn't too noteworthy: just your basic extern(C) and 
#define->enum stuff, and not even entirely complete.  I am unlikely to 
put future work into this wrapper.  I am probably going to avoid using 
PDFs because they can't be reprocessed easily once I generate them.

Caveats:
- The libpng wrapper lacks good build scripts.  It is currently using 
some shell scripts that hardcode usage of gcc/dmd.  I don't have time to 
make more appropriate scripts.  Windows users will have to bring their 
own entirely.
- The libsane wrapper also lacks build scripts, but is so simple that 
you can probably figure it out.
- The libpng and libharu wrappers both lack self-tests for type-size and 
struct-layout agreement.
- The libharu wrapper is not a complete or exhaustive wrapper by any means.
- These are all for static linking, but some of these might be more 
appropriate to dynamically link.  The only reason this isn't done right 
now is because of the work it would require and my lack of time.
- I can't guarantee future time investment on these.  They are good 
enough at this point that they will sink much lower on my priority list 
as I move on to other parts of my project.


I would offer deimos inclusion, though I am not sure what the 
requirements are.  I know I have a good list of caveats there, so this 
only makes sense if deimos accepts things on a "good enough for now; 
patches accepted" kind of basis.
Apr 16 2013
next sibling parent reply Walter Bright <newshound2 digitalmars.com> writes:
 On 4/16/2013 4:34 PM, Chad Joan wrote:


https://github.com/d-programming-deimos


 I would offer deimos inclusion, though I am not sure what the requirements are.
 I know I have a good list of caveats there, so this only makes sense if deimos
 accepts things on a "good enough for now; patches accepted" kind of basis.


I think if you include the list of shortcomings in the readme, it'll be all
right.

Just let me know if you want to do it.
Apr 16 2013
parent Chad Joan <chadjoan gmail.com> writes:
On 04/17/2013 02:07 AM, Walter Bright wrote:

  > On 4/16/2013 4:34 PM, Chad Joan wrote:

 https://github.com/d-programming-deimos


 I would offer deimos inclusion, though I am not sure what the
 requirements are.
 I know I have a good list of caveats there, so this only makes sense
 if deimos
 accepts things on a "good enough for now; patches accepted" kind of
 basis.


 I think if you include the list of shortcomings in the readme, it'll be
 all right.

 Just let me know if you want to do it.


Alright.  I'm interested.

libsane is the easy one, so let's start with that:
https://github.com/chadjoan/libsane

I stripped out my wrapper/abstraction part.  This repository should 
contain only bindings, and fairly complete ones at that.

Let me know what I need to do next.

I'll prep others as I find time.
Apr 22 2013
prev sibling parent Jacob Carlborg <doob me.com> writes:
On 2013-04-17 01:34, Chad Joan wrote:

 I just spent a few days creating a wrapper for libpng.  It isn't
 perfect, but I figured someone might want to know about this code.  I
 also made libsane and libharu wrappers earlier.


Sounds like you're having some kind of wrappers in addition to the 
bindings. Just make sure they are separate and the bindings can be 
usable on its own. That's the convention in deimos, only bindings, not 
wrappers.

-- 
/Jacob Carlborg
Apr 16 2013