Quick update on project status

[Igor Nekrestyanov]

Hi Roman,
>> At the moment proposed fix for replacing encumbered T2K library with 
>> freetype is under code review.
>> Upon approval (it is over 3500 lines and review will likely take some 
>> time and several iterations)
>> changes will start making their way to master workspace and going public.
>> Depending on integration windows schedule this will take few weeks to 
>> land on openjdk.java.net.
>>     
>
> Great! So this is will be a complete replacement for the encumbered T2K
> library?
>   
Yes, there will be no t2k binary library in the OpenJDK and OepnJDK will 
be runnable
(at least it works for me :).

There could be compatibility issues (have yet to pass JCK) but these 
should be possible to fix.
We can not enable truetype hinting by default though.
>> Changes introduce abstraction of scaler engine (sun.font.FontScaler) and 
>> implementations for Freetype and T2K.
>> They were tested with freetype 2.3.4 but likely should work with all 
>> 2.3.* versions.
>>     
>
> 'Abstraction of scaler engine', does that mean that it would be possible
> to provide alternative implementations? I would be very interested in
> that (I told you in Brussels).
>
>   
Theoretically - yes.
So far there are 3 implementations - t2k font scaler, freetype font 
scaler and null font scaler.
Selection logic is hardcoded for now but this can be revised later and 
easy to change in source code.

As every abstraction this one may be not ideal for all type of raterizers.
I tried to make it generic enough to handle both freetype and t2k but 
trying to avoid
changing everything (high risk of breaking too much).

I hope we can further improve this as it will be needed.
>> Let me know if you are interested to help with improving freetype based 
>> implementation.
>> Perhaps we can find way to get you involved even before changes become 
>> available to general public.
>>     
>
> I would be interested in having a look, and Francis from Redhat too
> AFAIK.
>   
Let me find out how we can organize this.

-igor