xref: /minix3/common/dist/zlib/contrib/delphi/readme.txt (revision 44bedb31d842b4b0444105519bcf929a69fe2dc1)
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2*44bedb31SLionel SambucOverview
3*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc========
4*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc
5*44bedb31SLionel SambucThis directory contains an update to the ZLib interface unit,
6*44bedb31SLionel Sambucdistributed by Borland as a Delphi supplemental component.
7*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc
8*44bedb31SLionel SambucThe original ZLib unit is Copyright (c) 1997,99 Borland Corp.,
9*44bedb31SLionel Sambucand is based on zlib version 1.0.4.  There are a series of bugs
10*44bedb31SLionel Sambucand security problems associated with that old zlib version, and
11*44bedb31SLionel Sambucwe recommend the users to update their ZLib unit.
12*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc
13*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc
14*44bedb31SLionel SambucSummary of modifications
15*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc========================
16*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc
17*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc- Improved makefile, adapted to zlib version 1.2.1.
18*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc
19*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc- Some field types from TZStreamRec are changed from Integer to
20*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc  Longint, for consistency with the zlib.h header, and for 64-bit
21*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc  readiness.
22*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc
23*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc- The zlib_version constant is updated.
24*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc
25*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc- The new Z_RLE strategy has its corresponding symbolic constant.
26*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc
27*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc- The allocation and deallocation functions and function types
28*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc  (TAlloc, TFree, zlibAllocMem and zlibFreeMem) are now cdecl,
29*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc  and _malloc and _free are added as C RTL stubs.  As a result,
30*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc  the original C sources of zlib can be compiled out of the box,
31*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc  and linked to the ZLib unit.
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33*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc
34*44bedb31SLionel SambucSuggestions for improvements
35*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc============================
36*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc
37*44bedb31SLionel SambucCurrently, the ZLib unit provides only a limited wrapper around
38*44bedb31SLionel Sambucthe zlib library, and much of the original zlib functionality is
39*44bedb31SLionel Sambucmissing.  Handling compressed file formats like ZIP/GZIP or PNG
40*44bedb31SLionel Sambuccannot be implemented without having this functionality.
41*44bedb31SLionel SambucApplications that handle these formats are either using their own,
42*44bedb31SLionel Sambucduplicated code, or not using the ZLib unit at all.
43*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc
44*44bedb31SLionel SambucHere are a few suggestions:
45*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc
46*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc- Checksum class wrappers around adler32() and crc32(), similar
47*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc  to the Java classes that implement the java.util.zip.Checksum
48*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc  interface.
49*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc
50*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc- The ability to read and write raw deflate streams, without the
51*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc  zlib stream header and trailer.  Raw deflate streams are used
52*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc  in the ZIP file format.
53*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc
54*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc- The ability to read and write gzip streams, used in the GZIP
55*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc  file format, and normally produced by the gzip program.
56*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc
57*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc- The ability to select a different compression strategy, useful
58*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc  to PNG and MNG image compression, and to multimedia compression
59*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc  in general.  Besides the compression level
60*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc
61*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc    TCompressionLevel = (clNone, clFastest, clDefault, clMax);
62*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc
63*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc  which, in fact, could have used the 'z' prefix and avoided
64*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc  TColor-like symbols
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66*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc    TCompressionLevel = (zcNone, zcFastest, zcDefault, zcMax);
67*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc
68*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc  there could be a compression strategy
69*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc
70*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc    TCompressionStrategy = (zsDefault, zsFiltered, zsHuffmanOnly, zsRle);
71*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc
72*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc- ZIP and GZIP stream handling via TStreams.
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74*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc
75*44bedb31SLionel Sambuc--
76*44bedb31SLionel SambucCosmin Truta <cosmint@cs.ubbcluj.ro>
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