GNU bug report logs - #59243
28.2.50; Larger Fringe Bitmaps

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Message #5 received at submit <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Daniel Mendler <mail <at> daniel-mendler.de>
To: bug-gnu-emacs <at> gnu.org
Cc: Dmitry Gutov <dgutov <at> yandex.ru>
Subject: 28.2.50; Larger Fringe Bitmaps
Date: Sun, 13 Nov 2022 11:08:19 +0100

[Message part 1 (text/plain, inline)]

Dear Emacs maintainers,

on Emacs 28, when using large screens, I find the fringe bitmaps
barely recognizable. I've seen there has been a previous discussion
about using characters for the fringe, such that we get scaling, but
this seems to be a longer term effort.

For now if we want to stick to bitmaps of width 8, we could still do
a bit better by using thicker lines, by using the space more
completely and by increasing the height of the bitmaps slightly.

Please consider the fringe bitmaps I've defined in bigger-fringe.el.
This is a cheap change which nevertheless should increase
accessibility a little bit. I override the bitmaps defined in
fringe.c, flymake.el, diff.el and diff-hl.el. The file
bigger-fringe.el contains the command `fringe-bitmap-test', which
I've used to create a screenshot of the updated fringe bitmaps. I've
attached the screenshot for comparison.

[screenshot.png (image/png, attachment)]

[bigger-fringe.el (text/plain, attachment)]

Message #8 received at 59243 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org>
To: Daniel Mendler <mail <at> daniel-mendler.de>
Cc: 59243 <at> debbugs.gnu.org, dgutov <at> yandex.ru
Subject: Re: bug#59243: 28.2.50; Larger Fringe Bitmaps
Date: Sun, 13 Nov 2022 13:47:46 +0200

> Cc: Dmitry Gutov <dgutov <at> yandex.ru>
> Date: Sun, 13 Nov 2022 11:08:19 +0100
> From: Daniel Mendler <mail <at> daniel-mendler.de>
> 
> on Emacs 28, when using large screens, I find the fringe bitmaps
> barely recognizable. I've seen there has been a previous discussion
> about using characters for the fringe, such that we get scaling, but
> this seems to be a longer term effort.
> 
> For now if we want to stick to bitmaps of width 8, we could still do
> a bit better by using thicker lines, by using the space more
> completely and by increasing the height of the bitmaps slightly.
> 
> Please consider the fringe bitmaps I've defined in bigger-fringe.el.
> This is a cheap change which nevertheless should increase
> accessibility a little bit. I override the bitmaps defined in
> fringe.c, flymake.el, diff.el and diff-hl.el. The file
> bigger-fringe.el contains the command `fringe-bitmap-test', which
> I've used to create a screenshot of the updated fringe bitmaps. I've
> attached the screenshot for comparison.

Thanks, but is the intent of bigger-fringe.el to have the user load it
manually?  If so, this is sub-optimal: Emacs should switch to larger
fringe bitmaps automatically based on the screen DPI, or perhaps scale
them.

Message #11 received at 59243 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Daniel Mendler <mail <at> daniel-mendler.de>
To: Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org>
Cc: 59243 <at> debbugs.gnu.org, dgutov <at> yandex.ru
Subject: Re: bug#59243: 28.2.50; Larger Fringe Bitmaps
Date: Sun, 13 Nov 2022 14:08:06 +0100

On 11/13/22 12:47, Eli Zaretskii wrote:
> Thanks, but is the intent of bigger-fringe.el to have the user load it
> manually?  If so, this is sub-optimal: Emacs should switch to larger
> fringe bitmaps automatically based on the screen DPI, or perhaps scale
> them.

My idea here would be to just replace the existing bitmaps with the ones
proposed in bigger-fringe.el. They have the same width, but are a little
bit higher. This way they work better with bigger screens and larger
font sizes while still retaining the thin fringe width. The downside is
that the bitmaps look more compressed horizontally - there is less
breathing space to the text right next to the fringe.

Another alternative could be to provide an alternative larger fringe
bitmap set which is used at larger resolution, if the
left/right-fringe-width is larger than 8. Would you prefer that?

If we indeed want to go the route to auto scale the bitmaps, then I
would go the route via characters or via svg, since scaling the bitmaps
will probably not give great results in contrast to hand-crafted bitmaps.

Daniel

Message #14 received at 59243 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org>
To: Daniel Mendler <mail <at> daniel-mendler.de>
Cc: 59243 <at> debbugs.gnu.org, dgutov <at> yandex.ru
Subject: Re: bug#59243: 28.2.50; Larger Fringe Bitmaps
Date: Sun, 13 Nov 2022 15:48:54 +0200

> Date: Sun, 13 Nov 2022 14:08:06 +0100
> Cc: 59243 <at> debbugs.gnu.org, dgutov <at> yandex.ru
> From: Daniel Mendler <mail <at> daniel-mendler.de>
> 
> On 11/13/22 12:47, Eli Zaretskii wrote:
> > Thanks, but is the intent of bigger-fringe.el to have the user load it
> > manually?  If so, this is sub-optimal: Emacs should switch to larger
> > fringe bitmaps automatically based on the screen DPI, or perhaps scale
> > them.
> 
> My idea here would be to just replace the existing bitmaps with the ones
> proposed in bigger-fringe.el. They have the same width, but are a little
> bit higher.

They seem too large to me, but I wonder what do others think.

In any case, if we accept the bigger defaults, the built-in bitmaps in
fringe.c should be updated.

> Another alternative could be to provide an alternative larger fringe
> bitmap set which is used at larger resolution, if the
> left/right-fringe-width is larger than 8. Would you prefer that?

Yes, but the problem is how to do that automatically.  I think people
have tried in the past but bumped into difficulties.

> If we indeed want to go the route to auto scale the bitmaps, then I
> would go the route via characters or via svg, since scaling the bitmaps
> will probably not give great results in contrast to hand-crafted bitmaps.

Probably.  Indeed, supporting SVG icons on the fringes would be a
useful feature.

Message #17 received at 59243 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Juri Linkov <juri <at> linkov.net>
To: Daniel Mendler <mail <at> daniel-mendler.de>
Cc: 59243 <at> debbugs.gnu.org, Dmitry Gutov <dgutov <at> yandex.ru>
Subject: Re: bug#59243: 28.2.50; Larger Fringe Bitmaps
Date: Sun, 13 Nov 2022 19:49:48 +0200

> Please consider the fringe bitmaps I've defined in bigger-fringe.el.
> This is a cheap change which nevertheless should increase
> accessibility a little bit. I override the bitmaps defined in
> fringe.c, flymake.el, diff.el and diff-hl.el. The file
> bigger-fringe.el contains the command `fringe-bitmap-test', which
> I've used to create a screenshot of the updated fringe bitmaps. I've
> attached the screenshot for comparison.

Oh, I have the opposite problem: the default fringe bitmaps are too big
for my font size.  So I have to use smaller versions:

  (define-fringe-bitmap 'light-down-arrow [32 32 32 32 32 32 168 112 32] nil nil 'bottom)
  (define-fringe-bitmap 'light-up-arrow [32 112 168 32 32 32 32 32 32] nil nil 'top)
  (define-fringe-bitmap 'light-top-left-angle [254 254 128 128 128] nil nil 'top)
  (define-fringe-bitmap 'light-bottom-left-angle [128 128 128 254 254] nil  nil 'bottom)
  (define-fringe-bitmap 'light-left-bracket [254 254 128 128 128 0 0 0 0 128 128 128 254 254] nil nil 'center)
  (define-fringe-bitmap 'light-right-curly-arrow [96 16 8 8 72 80 96 120] nil nil 'bottom)
  (define-fringe-bitmap 'light-left-curly-arrow [8 16 16 16 18 10 6 30] nil nil 'top)
  (define-fringe-bitmap 'light-right-arrow [16 8 252 8 16] nil 11 'center)
  (define-fringe-bitmap 'light-left-arrow [32 64 254 64 32] nil nil 'center)
  (setq-default fringe-indicator-alist
                '((truncation . (light-left-arrow light-right-arrow))
                  (continuation . (light-left-curly-arrow light-right-curly-arrow))
                  (overlay-arrow . right-triangle)
                  (up . light-up-arrow)
                  (down . light-down-arrow)
                  (top . (light-top-left-angle top-right-angle))
                  (bottom . (light-bottom-left-angle bottom-right-angle
                             top-right-angle light-top-left-angle))
                  (top-bottom . (light-left-bracket right-bracket
                                 top-right-angle light-top-left-angle))
                  (empty-line . empty-line)
                  (unknown . question-mark)))

Maybe a new customizable option could allow to select from different sets
of bitmaps with such labels as "Large", "Medium", "Small".

Message #20 received at 59243 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org>
To: Juri Linkov <juri <at> linkov.net>
Cc: 59243 <at> debbugs.gnu.org, mail <at> daniel-mendler.de, dgutov <at> yandex.ru
Subject: Re: bug#59243: 28.2.50; Larger Fringe Bitmaps
Date: Sun, 13 Nov 2022 20:17:32 +0200

> Cc: 59243 <at> debbugs.gnu.org, Dmitry Gutov <dgutov <at> yandex.ru>
> From: Juri Linkov <juri <at> linkov.net>
> Date: Sun, 13 Nov 2022 19:49:48 +0200
> 
> Maybe a new customizable option could allow to select from different sets
> of bitmaps with such labels as "Large", "Medium", "Small".

That could be useful, I think.  Assuming that Someone(TM) will come up
with the 2 additional sets of bitmaps.

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