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1<?php header("Content-Type: text/html; charset=utf-8"); ?>
2<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.1//EN"
3       "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml11.dtd">
4
5<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en">
6
7<head>
8   <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" />
9   <meta name="GENERATOR" content="vim" />
10   <meta name="Author" content="sam@zoy.org (Sam Hocevar)" />
11   <meta name="Description" content="libcaca - Colour AsCii Art library" />
12   <meta name="Keywords" content="libcaca, ASCII, ASCII ART, console, text mode, ncurses, slang, AAlib" />
13   <title>libcaca - Colour AsCii Art library</title>
14   <link rel="icon" type="image/x-icon" href="/favicon.ico" />
15   <link rel="shortcut icon" type="image/x-icon" href="/favicon.ico" />
16   <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="/main.css" />
17</head>
18
19<body>
20
21<?php include($_SERVER["DOCUMENT_ROOT"]."/header.inc"); ?>
22
23<img src="logo-caca.png" width="128" height="128"
24     alt="libcaca logo" style="margin: 20px; float: right;" />
25
26<h2> Introduction </h2>
27
28<p> The libcaca library is a graphics library that outputs text instead of
29pixels, so that it can work on older video cards or text terminals. It is not
30unlike the famous <a href="http://aa-project.sourceforge.net/aalib/">AAlib</a>
31library, with the following improvements:
32
33<ul>
34  <li> Unicode support </li>
35  <li> 4096 available colours (some devices can only handle 16) </li>
36  <li> dithering of colour images </li>
37  <li> advanced text canvas operations (blitting, rotations) </li>
38</ul>
39
40<p> Libcaca works in a text terminal (and should thus work on all Unix
41systems including Mac OS X) using the S-Lang or ncurses libraries. It also
42works natively on DOS and Windows.
43
44<p> Libcaca is <a href="http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html">free
45software</a>, and can be used, modified and distributed under the terms of the
46<a href="http://sam.zoy.org/wtfpl/">Do What The Fuck You Want To Public
47License</a>. The logo on this page is copyrighted by Akira Toriyama so if
48anyone fancies drawing a new logo it would be much appreciated. </p>
49
50<h2> Screenshots </h2>
51
52<p> Here are a few libcaca screenshots. </p>
53
54<table cellspacing="5" border="0">
55  <tr>
56    <td align="center">
57      <a href="img/stitch-80x45.png"><img alt="cacaview"
58         width="73" height="90"
59         src="img/tn-stitch-80x45.jpeg" /></a>
60      <br /><small><code>cacaview</code></small>
61    </td>
62    <td align="center">
63      <a href="img/cacaball-80x50.png"><img alt="cacaball"
64         width="101" height="90"
65         src="img/tn-cacaball-80x50.jpeg" /></a>
66      <br /><small><code>cacaball</code></small>
67    </td>
68    <td align="center">
69      <a href="img/cacaplas-80x50.png"><img alt="cacaplas"
70         width="101" height="90"
71         src="img/tn-cacaplas-80x50.jpeg" /></a>
72      <br /><small><code>cacaplas</code></small>
73    </td>
74    <td align="center">
75      <a href="img/truecolor-32x16.png"><img alt="truecolor"
76         width="87" height="90"
77         src="img/tn-truecolor-32x16.jpeg" /></a>
78      <br /><small>TrueColor</small>
79    </td>
80    <td align="center">
81      <a href="img/unicode-80x24.png"><img alt="unicode"
82         width="120" height="75"
83         src="img/tn-unicode-80x24.jpeg" /></a>
84      <br /><small>Unicode</small>
85    </td>
86  </tr>
87</table>
88
89<p> See also the various export formats:
90  <a href="export.png">PNG</a> (through TGA),
91  <a href="export.html">HTML</a>,
92  <a href="export.svg">SVG</a>,
93  <a href="export.ps">PostScript</a>.
94</p>
95
96<h2> Where is the old libcaca page? </h2>
97
98<p> libcaca is currently undergoing a massive rewrite, and as such all
99previous patches and code examples are broken. Until this is done I have
100decided to put most of this page offline. </p>
101
102<h2> Developers </h2>
103
104<p> The latest libcaca snapshot is <a
105href="libcaca-0.99.beta1.tar.gz">libcaca-0.99.beta1.tar.gz</a>. Please
106download and test it. If you are a developer, please comment on the current
107API and let me know what is missing. </p>
108
109<p> Important links: </p>
110
111<ul>
112  <li> Documentation in <a href="doc/">HTML format</a> </li>
113
114  <li> Documentation in <a href="libcaca.pdf">PDF format</a> </li>
115
116  <li> Mailing-list: <a
117  href="mailto:libcaca&#64;lists.zoy.org">libcaca&#64;lists.zoy.org</a>
118  (To subscribe, send an email to <a
119  href="mailto:ecartis&#64;lists.zoy.org">ecartis&#64;lists.zoy.org</a>
120  containing the words "<code>subscribe libcaca</code>". To unsubscribe, just
121  use "<code>unsubscribe libcaca</code>".) </li>
122
123  <li> Mailing-list <a href="threads.html">archives</a> </li>
124
125  <li> Subversion repository: <code>svn://svn.zoy.org/libcaca/trunk</code> </li>
126
127  <li> Subversion
128  <a href="/cgi-bin/viewcvs.cgi/trunk/?root=libcaca">web interface</a> </li>
129</ul>
130
131<!--
132<p> Here are my first libcaca attempts. The first image is,
133<code>cacaview</code>, the libcaca image viewer. Then, two
134screenshots of my first port of an application to libcaca: the <a
135href="http://www.videolan.org/vlc/">VLC</a> media player. The last
136screenshots are from <code>cacafire</code> (the libcaca port of aafire) and
137<code>cacaball</code> (a mini metaballs demo). </p>
138
139<table cellspacing="5" border="0">
140  <tr>
141    <td align="center">
142      <a href="caca-stitch.png"><img alt="cacaview"
143         width="78" height="90"
144         src="tn-caca-stitch.jpeg" /><br /><code>cacaview</code></a>
145    </td>
146    <td align="center">
147      <a href="caca-vlc.png"><img alt="VLC playing the Matrix: Revolutions"
148         width="120" height="74"
149         src="tn-caca-vlc.jpeg" /><br />VLC media player</a>
150    </td>
151    <td align="center">
152      <a href="caca-vlc3.png"><img alt="VLC playing a Dolby trailer"
153         width="120" height="74"
154         src="tn-caca-vlc3.jpeg" /><br />VLC media player</a>
155    </td>
156    <td align="center">
157      <a href="caca-fire.png"><img alt="cacafire"
158         width="120" height="87"
159         src="tn-caca-fire.jpeg" /><br /><code>cacafire</code></a>
160    </td>
161    <td align="center">
162      <a href="caca-ball.png"><img alt="cacaball"
163         width="104" height="90"
164         src="tn-caca-ball.jpeg" /><br /><code>cacaball</code></a>
165    </td>
166  </tr>
167</table>
168
169<p> As with all image processing applications, I needed the obligatory <a
170href="http://www-2.cs.cmu.edu/~chuck/lennapg/">Lenna</a> samples. From
171left to right: the currently in development Floyd-Steinberg dithering, the
172antialiasing introduced in libcaca 0.5, the new renderer in libcaca 0.2, no
173dithering, ordered dithering, random dithering. </p>
174
175<table cellspacing="5" border="0">
176  <tr>
177    <td align="center">
178      <a href="lenna-fs.png"><img alt="Lenna (Floyd-Steinberg)"
179         width="87" height="90"
180         src="tn-lenna-fs.jpeg" /><br />Floyd-Steinberg</a>
181    </td>
182    <td align="center">
183      <a href="lenna-antialias.png"><img alt="Lenna (antialiased)"
184         width="97" height="90"
185         src="tn-lenna-antialias.jpeg" /><br />antialiasing</a>
186    </td>
187    <td align="center">
188      <a href="lenna-new.png"><img alt="Lenna (new renderer)"
189         width="99" height="90"
190         src="tn-lenna-new.jpeg" /><br />new renderer</a>
191    </td>
192    <td align="center">
193      <a href="lenna-nodither.png"><img alt="Lenna (no dithering)"
194         width="99" height="90"
195         src="tn-lenna-nodither.jpeg" /><br />no dithering</a>
196    </td>
197    <td align="center">
198      <a href="lenna-ordered.png"><img alt="Lenna (ordered dithering)"
199         width="99" height="90"
200         src="tn-lenna-ordered.jpeg" /><br />ordered dithering</a>
201    </td>
202    <td align="center">
203      <a href="lenna-random.png"><img alt="Lenna (random dithering)"
204         width="99" height="90"
205         src="tn-lenna-random.jpeg" /><br />random dithering</a>
206    </td>
207  </tr>
208</table>
209
210<p> Here are a few examples of my libcaca patch for libSDL. Once there is a
211libcaca backend for <a href="http://www.libsdl.org">libSDL</a>, any program
212using SDL can automatically benefit from libcaca’s rendering routines. These
213examples show <a href="http://www.frozen-bubble.org/">Frozen Bubble</a>, the
214<a href="http://sabre.cobite.com/">SABRE</a> flight simulator, and the famous
215<a href="http://www.idsoftware.com/games/doom/">Doom</a>. Frozen Bubble is
216fully playable, but SABRE and Doom aren’t much due to the Ctrl and Shift keys
217not being recognized (see the TODO list about that). </p>
218
219<table cellspacing="5" border="0">
220  <tr>
221    <td align="center">
222      <a href="caca-fb.png"><img alt="ASCII art Frozen Bubble"
223         width="120" height="90"
224         src="tn-caca-fb.jpeg" /><br />Frozen Bubble</a>
225    </td>
226    <td align="center">
227      <a href="caca-sabre.png"><img alt="the SABRE flight simulator"
228         width="120" height="90"
229         src="tn-caca-sabre.jpeg" /><br />SABRE</a>
230    </td>
231    <td align="center">
232      <a href="caca-doom.png"><img alt="the Doom splash screen in ASCII art"
233         width="120" height="90"
234         src="tn-caca-doom.jpeg" /><br />Doom splash screen</a>
235    </td>
236    <td align="center">
237      <a href="caca-doom2.png"><img alt="Doom in ASCII art"
238         width="120" height="90"
239         src="tn-caca-doom2.jpeg" /><br />first Doom level</a>
240    </td>
241  </tr>
242</table>
243
244<h2> Download libcaca </h2>
245
246<p> Latest libcaca release is <a
247href="libcaca-0.9.tar.gz">libcaca-0.9.tar.gz</a> (216KB) / <a
248href="libcaca-0.9.tar.bz2">libcaca-0.9.tar.bz2</a> (172KB). See the <a
249href="NEWS">NEWS</a> and <a href="ChangeLog">ChangeLog</a> files. </p>
250
251<p> libcaca is already in the Debian sid distribution. Debian woody users or
252sid users in a hurry may use one of the following apt sources: (sorry, sarge
253is not supported yet) </p>
254
255<table class="leftmenu" cellspacing="5" cellpadding="0">
256  <tr>
257    <td class="nowrap" valign="top">
258      <code>
259        deb http://sam.zoy.org/projects/debian woody main<br />
260        deb-src http://sam.zoy.org/projects/debian woody main<br />
261        <br />
262        deb http://sam.zoy.org/projects/debian sid main<br />
263        deb-src http://sam.zoy.org/projects/debian sid main<br />
264      </code>
265    </td>
266  </tr>
267</table>
268
269<p> Users of RPM-based distributions (Red Hat, Fedora, Mandrake) may find RPM
270packages on the <a href="http://yarrow.freshrpms.net/rpm.html?id=552">Fresh
271RPMs</a> page. If no package is available, you are encouraged
272to build packages for your system using this SRPM (<a
273href="libcaca-0.9-1.src.rpm">libcaca-0.9-1.src.rpm</a>, 176KB) and this simple
274command line: </p>
275
276<table class="leftmenu" cellspacing="5" cellpadding="0">
277  <tr>
278    <td class="nowrap" valign="top">
279      <code>rpm -<!>-rebuild libcaca-0.9-1.src.rpm</code>
280    </td>
281  </tr>
282</table>
283
284<p> BSD users should see the <a
285href="http://www.netbsd.org/packages/graphics/libcaca/README.html">NetBSD port
286page</a> and the <a href="http://www.freshports.org/graphics/libcaca/">FreeBSD
287port page</a> (I am not aware of an OpenBSD port yet, but <a
288href="http://news.gw.com/openbsd.ports/15502">this email</a> has
289information on it), Gentoo users may find information on the <a
290href="http://gentoo-portage.com/browse-program.php?program=6273">Gentoo
291portage</a> and Slackware users have a package on <a
292href="http://www.linuxpackages.net/pkg_details.php?id=2144">linuxpackages.net</a>.
293</p>
294
295<p> A Windows zip archive containing the libcaca demos can be downloaded here:
296<a href="libcaca-win32-0.9.zip">libcaca-win32-0.9.zip</a> (100KB). </p>
297
298<h2> Patch for libSDL </h2>
299
300<p> This simple patch was quickly hacked from the AAlib video
301driver. Apply it to the libSDL sources and configuree libSDL with
302<code>-<!>-enable-video-caca</code>. Then use the <code>SDL_VIDEODRIVER</code>
303environment variable to run your SDL programs with libcaca output, for
304instance Frozen Bubble: </p>
305
306<table class="leftmenu" cellspacing="5" cellpadding="0">
307  <tr>
308    <td class="nowrap" valign="top">
309      <code>SDL_VIDEODRIVER=caca frozen-bubble</code>
310    </td>
311  </tr>
312</table>
313
314<p> Download <a href="patch-libsdl1.2-libcaca0.7.diff">patch-libsdl1.2-libcaca0.7.diff</a> (to be used with the Debian unstable SDL sources and libcaca 0.7. </p>
315
316<h2> Patches for VLC, xine, mplayer... </h2>
317
318<p> The libcaca patch for the <a href="http://www.videolan.org/vlc/">VLC</a>
319media player was already applied upstream. Check the CVS version. </p>
320
321<p> There is a work in progress for <a href="http://xine.sf.net/">xine</a>
322called cacaxine (see <a href="http://sourceforge.net/mailarchive/forum.php?thread_id=3605187&amp;forum_id=7131">this email</a>). Zeeshan Ali wrote a
323<a href="http://gstreamer.sf.net/">GStreamer</a> plugin. I am not
324aware of an <a href="http://mplayerhq.hu/">MPlayer</a> patch yet (but you
325should not be using MPlayer anyway, because it sucks). </p>
326
327<h2> Documentation </h2>
328
329<p> See the <a href="doc/index.html">HTML documentation</a>. </p>
330
331<h2> Development </h2>
332
333<p> The mailing-list for libcaca users and developers is <a
334href="mailto:libcaca&#64;lists.zoy.org">libcaca&#64;lists.zoy.org</a>.
335To subscribe, send an email to <a
336href="mailto:ecartis&#64;lists.zoy.org">ecartis&#64;lists.zoy.org</a>
337containing the words "<code>subscribe libcaca</code>". To unsubscribe, just
338use "<code>unsubscribe libcaca</code>". </p>
339
340<p> Please report bugs and make suggestions to <a
341href="mailto:libcaca&#64;lists.zoy.org">libcaca&#64;lists.zoy.org</a> and
342don’t forget to check the <a href="threads.html">mailing-list archives</a>.
343</p>
344
345<p> The libcaca development is managed using <a
346href="http://subversion.tigris.org">Subversion</a>. The
347<code>svn://svn.zoy.org/libcaca/</code> repository can be browsed using the <a
348href="/cgi-bin/viewcvs.cgi/trunk/?root=libcaca">web interface</a>, or directly
349with the Subversion client. For instance, to retrieve the main trunk, use this
350command: </p>
351
352<table class="leftmenu" cellspacing="5" cellpadding="0">
353  <tr>
354    <td class="nowrap" valign="top">
355      <code>svn co svn://svn.zoy.org/libcaca/trunk libcaca-trunk</code>
356    </td>
357  </tr>
358</table>
359
360<p> To retrieve a specific tag, e.g. 0.3, use this: </p>
361
362<table class="leftmenu" cellspacing="5" cellpadding="0">
363  <tr>
364    <td class="nowrap" valign="top">
365      <code>svn co svn://svn.zoy.org/libcaca/tags/0.3 libcaca-0.3</code>
366    </td>
367  </tr>
368</table>
369-->
370
371<h2> Why? </h2>
372
373<blockquote><p>
374Que dites-vous ?... C’est inutile ?... Je le sais !
375<br />Mais on ne se bat pas dans l’espoir du succès !
376<br />Non ! non, c’est bien plus beau lorsque c’est inutile !
377<br /><small> -- Edmond Rostand, <i>Cyrano de Bergerac</i> </small>
378</p></blockquote>
379
380<p> I am perfectly aware that libcaca is the waste of time it looks to be. No
381need to tell me about that. I urge you to read Théophile Gautier’s preface to
382<i>Mademoiselle de Maupin</i>, which also gives an excellent explanation for
383the name “libcaca”: </p>
384
385<blockquote><p>
386Il n’y a rien de vraiment beau que ce qui ne peut servir à rien ; tout ce
387qui est utile est laid ; car c’est l’expression de quelque besoin ; et ceux
388de l’homme sont ignobles et dégoûtants, comme sa pauvre et infirme nature. -
389L’endroit le plus utile d’une maison, ce sont les latrines.
390</p></blockquote>
391
392<p> As for the name “libcucul”, please refer to the pioneer of modernist
393Polish fiction: </p>
394
395<blockquote><p>
396Mais contre le cucul, il n’y a pas de refuge. Courez après moi
397si vous voulez, je m’enfuis la gueule entre les mains. Et voilà,
398tralala, Zut à celui qui le lira !
399<br /><small> -- Witold Gombrowicz, <i>Ferdydurke</i> </small>
400</p></blockquote>
401
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