The idea is to get rid of the need of conversion programs. All I want to do is to \includegraphics{foo.jpg} or \includegraphics{foo.gif} or \includegraphics{foo.png} (The last is actually possible to do with pdflatex). I dont want to be dependent on a number of external conversion utilities. /A ----- Original Message ----- From: "Heiko Oberdiek" <[log in to unmask]> To: <[log in to unmask]> Sent: Sunday, September 22, 2002 10:47 AM Subject: Re: proposal [graphics] > On Sun, Sep 22, 2002 at 10:50:51AM +0100, Robin Fairbairns wrote: > > > > I am still new to LaTeX, but I cant resist on giving a proposal for a LaTeX > > > improvement. > > > > > > I think that any of the 20 most common graphics formats shall be > > > include:able using \includegraphics. > > > > > > Bitmap as well as vector. > > > Using latex as well as using pdflatex. > > > > the problem is, that to first order, this is nothing to do with latex > > itself. > > At least it has to do with the interface to LaTeX's graphicx > package. > > > latex needs to know the dimensions of the graphic, only. > > There are a lot of "graphics" formats (eg. PDF, PS, ...) > that contain several "pages", so the graphicx package needs > to know the number of pages, too. > > > the rest is > > down to the dvi->whatever converter (in the case of latex) or to > > pdftex itself (in the case of pdflatex). > > * dvi->whatever, pdfTeX, VTeX, ... use its own methods. > pdfTeX, VTeX can provide bounding box informations back > to TeX, but this is not possible with dvi->whatever. > Perhaps a program by \immediate\write18 can help to > provide the information in this case. > * Some TeX implementations provide \immediate\write18, > so a conversion program could be called by the > graphicx package to get informations and the > understandable format of the graphics for the given driver. > * Plugin/Library method: > * Interface for inclusion in TeX, pdfTeX, ... for > extracting informations to LaTeX's graphicx package. > * Interface for inclusion in dvi->whatever, pdfTeX, ... > for reading the different graphics formats that are > then put into the output. > > Yours sincerely > Heiko <[log in to unmask]>