Path: utzoo!dptcdc!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!husc6!bloom-beacon!athena.mit.edu!warsh From: warsh@athena.mit.edu (Russell Williams) Newsgroups: comp.ivideodisc Subject: Re: Recommedation Message-ID: <10663@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU> Date: 16 Apr 89 23:50:26 GMT References: <1126@lts.UUCP> <7867@killer.Dallas.TX.US> Sender: daemon@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU Reply-To: warsh@athena.mit.edu (Russell Williams) Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology Lines: 34 In article <7867@killer.Dallas.TX.US> jls@killer.Dallas.TX.US (Jerome Schneider) writes: > Does anyone know of video-overlay systems that >allow I.V. under such windowing systems as X or the Miceysoft PM? Are >things like video "windows" imbedded in graphics windows available? >-- >Jerome Schneider UUCP: killer.DALLAS.TX.US!jls (guest account) >Aspen Technology Group Ft. Collins, CO Voice: (303) 484-8466 Here at Project Athena there are a number of projects underway that use a system with the X Window System version 11 on VAXstation II's with a Parallax graphics/video display board. The video capabilities available from the X server are somewhat primitive, taking the form of an extension to the core X11 protocol. Display of incoming video may be turned on on any X window by using an Xlib request. The video display options allow live video of a fixed size (640x482) pixels, still video of the same size (doesn't go away when the video source changes, but the last video frame digitized remains on screen until a X expose event happens), and a scaled mode, which allows a still portion of the incoming video frame to be displayed in a window of arbitrary size, with automatic scaling as desired. For people using the X Toolkit, there are several versions of a video widget floating around that handles these modes and X exposes automatically. Straight XLib programmers have to do it the hard way. With X11, you can also draw on top of the video windows in all video modes, although I don't know of any projects around here that use that capability. The whole setup is still a bit flakey, unfortunately, but getting better all the time. Unstable input video signals tend to become badly garbled when put into a window, so a direct feed from the videodisc player is best, although live cable TV works well. (We distribute images from a single videodisc player source using the campus cable network) -Russell Williams warsh@athena.mit.edu [ @mitvma.bitnet ] Boston Videodisc Project Rotch Visual Collection, MIT