From: wright@net.lbl.gov (Russ Wright)
Newsgroups: aus.net.directory.osi-ds
Subject: RE: photos in the directory
Date: 18 Aug 92 23:01:51 GMT

> Where do I get a picture-converter from, which transforms TIFF, IOCA,
 PCS, GIFF, or BITMAP -format into PBM or G3FAX -format ?
> I'm trying to include pictures into the DIT.
> 
> Thanks for help
> Alexander Runge
> (runge@ecan.ibm.de)

Hi Alexander,

JPEG is the new file format used for photos in the directory.  G3FAX is just Black 
& White (not grey scale or color) and is being phased out.

So, how do you convert from your image file format to JPEG?

Get jpegsrc.v3.tar.Z (see below).  This allows you to convert images from a number 
of formats to JPEG format.

[The currently supported image file formats are: PPM (PBMPLUS color format),
PGM (PBMPLUS gray-scale format), GIF, Targa, and RLE (Utah Raster Toolkit
format).  (RLE is supported only if the URT library is available.)]

Once you have the JPEG file, you will need to follow the instructions in the ISODE 
8.0 release to put it into the directory.  (You will probably want to get a copy 
of XV (from export.lcs.mit.edu) to display the photo on an X-Windows device). 

Russ
-----------

ARCHIVE LOCATIONS
=================
 
The "official" archive site for this software is ftp.uu.net (Internet
address 137.39.1.9 or 192.48.96.9).  The most recent released version can
always be found there in directory graphics/jpeg.  This particular version
will be archived as jpegsrc.v3.tar.Z.  If you are on the Internet, you can
retrieve files from UUNET by anonymous FTP.  If you don't have FTP access,
UUNET's archives are also available via UUCP; contact postmaster@uunet.uu.net
for information on retrieving files that way.
 
Various other Internet sites maintain copies of the UUNET file, which may or
may not be up-to-date.  In Europe, try nic.funet.fi (128.214.6.100; look in
directory pub/graphics/programs/jpeg).
 
You can also obtain this software from CompuServe, in the GRAPHSUPPORT forum
(GO PICS), library 10; this version will be file jpsrc3.zip.
 
If you are not reasonably handy at configuring and installing portable C
programs, you may have some difficulty installing this package.  You may
prefer to obtain a pre-built executable version.  A collection of pre-built
executables for various machines is currently available for anonymous FTP at
procyon.cis.ksu.edu (129.130.10.80 --- this number is due to change soon);
look under /pub/JPEG.  The administrators of this system ask that FTP traffic
be limited to non-prime hours.  For more information on this archive, please
contact Steve Davis (strat@cis.ksu.edu).  This collection is not maintained by
the Independent JPEG Group, and programs in it may not be the latest version.

SUPPORTING SOFTWARE
===================
 
You will probably want Jef Poskanzer's PBMPLUS image software, which provides
many useful operations on PPM-format image files.  In particular, it can
convert PPM images to and from a wide range of other formats.  You can FTP
this free software from export.lcs.mit.edu (contrib/pbmplus*.tar.Z) or
ftp.ee.lbl.gov (pbmplus*.tar.Z).  Unfortunately PBMPLUS is not nearly as
portable as the JPEG software is; you are likely to have difficulty making it
work on any non-Unix machine.
 
If you are using X Windows you might want to use the xv or xloadimage viewers
to save yourself the trouble of converting PPM to some other format.  Both of
these can be found in the contrib directory at export.lcs.mit.edu.  Actually,
xv version 2.00 and up incorporates our software and thus can read and write
JPEG files directly.  (NOTE: since xv internally reduces all images to 8
bits/pixel, a JPEG file written by xv will not be very high quality; you may
also prefer xloadimage for viewing if you have a 24-bit display.  Caveat user.)
 
For DOS machines, Lee Crocker's free Piclab program is a useful companion to
the JPEG software.  The latest version, currently 1.91, is available by FTP
from SIMTEL20 and its various mirror sites, file <msdos.graphics>piclb191.zip.
CompuServe also has it, in the same library as the JPEG software.