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Old 05-05-2019, 12:20 PM   #421
Xaos
Human being with feelings
 
Join Date: Sep 2015
Posts: 158
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Quote:
Originally Posted by MaXyM View Post
As @lokasenna said windows already provides api for rendering vector objects (for more than 20 years). speaking about reaper themes however, a developer must provide scripted theming infrastructure to end-user. That's it. I suppose working with images is easier for end users, maybe more efficient for a system.

Btw vectors are not a salvation.
There are different usage contexts dependent on output devices. Also designing vector based gui may be more complex/harder to a themers. In addition, vectors alone give simplified look only. Those still need to be supported by images to mimic look of some counterparts from real world. such images have to be scaled depending on output devce dpi (or ui scale if available). etc etc.
APIs for rendering vectors is very different from having the graphics engine support them at the OS level. In order for it to be efficient enough to use as an interface element, it needs to be built in and tightly integrated with the GPU and drivers, like macOS does/has done for a while now. Apps could always render vector images by making calls to libraries, but it's a totally different thing to have the OS handle them natively. Scaling and rendering complex color shading grids in vector items is pretty intense work, which is why games have used 3D frames with rasterised textures and lighting. It's something that the OS needs to be able to handle easily. I suppose someone could write the video equivalent to ASIO for Windows if video management is as bad in Windows as the audio management is.
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