1 libpng-manual.txt - A description on how to use and modify libpng
3 libpng version 1.5.6 - November 3, 2011
4 Updated and distributed by Glenn Randers-Pehrson
5 <glennrp at users.sourceforge.net>
6 Copyright (c) 1998-2011 Glenn Randers-Pehrson
8 This document is released under the libpng license.
9 For conditions of distribution and use, see the disclaimer
14 libpng versions 0.97, January 1998, through 1.5.6 - November 3, 2011
15 Updated and distributed by Glenn Randers-Pehrson
16 Copyright (c) 1998-2011 Glenn Randers-Pehrson
18 libpng 1.0 beta 6 version 0.96 May 28, 1997
19 Updated and distributed by Andreas Dilger
20 Copyright (c) 1996, 1997 Andreas Dilger
22 libpng 1.0 beta 2 - version 0.88 January 26, 1996
23 For conditions of distribution and use, see copyright
24 notice in png.h. Copyright (c) 1995, 1996 Guy Eric
25 Schalnat, Group 42, Inc.
27 Updated/rewritten per request in the libpng FAQ
28 Copyright (c) 1995, 1996 Frank J. T. Wojcik
29 December 18, 1995 & January 20, 1996
33 This file describes how to use and modify the PNG reference library
34 (known as libpng) for your own use. There are five sections to this
35 file: introduction, structures, reading, writing, and modification and
36 configuration notes for various special platforms. In addition to this
37 file, example.c is a good starting point for using the library, as
38 it is heavily commented and should include everything most people
39 will need. We assume that libpng is already installed; see the
40 INSTALL file for instructions on how to install libpng.
42 For examples of libpng usage, see the files "example.c", "pngtest.c",
43 and the files in the "contrib" directory, all of which are included in
44 the libpng distribution.
46 Libpng was written as a companion to the PNG specification, as a way
47 of reducing the amount of time and effort it takes to support the PNG
48 file format in application programs.
50 The PNG specification (second edition), November 2003, is available as
51 a W3C Recommendation and as an ISO Standard (ISO/IEC 15948:2003 (E)) at
52 <http://www.w3.org/TR/2003/REC-PNG-20031110/
53 The W3C and ISO documents have identical technical content.
55 The PNG-1.2 specification is available at
56 <http://www.libpng.org/pub/png/documents/>. It is technically equivalent
57 to the PNG specification (second edition) but has some additional material.
59 The PNG-1.0 specification is available
60 as RFC 2083 <http://www.libpng.org/pub/png/documents/> and as a
61 W3C Recommendation <http://www.w3.org/TR/REC.png.html>.
63 Some additional chunks are described in the special-purpose public chunks
64 documents at <http://www.libpng.org/pub/png/documents/>.
67 about PNG, and the latest version of libpng, can be found at the PNG home
68 page, <http://www.libpng.org/pub/png/>.
70 Most users will not have to modify the library significantly; advanced
71 users may want to modify it more. All attempts were made to make it as
72 complete as possible, while keeping the code easy to understand.
73 Currently, this library only supports C. Support for other languages
76 Libpng has been designed to handle multiple sessions at one time,
77 to be easily modifiable, to be portable to the vast majority of
78 machines (ANSI, K&R, 16-, 32-, and 64-bit) available, and to be easy
79 to use. The ultimate goal of libpng is to promote the acceptance of
80 the PNG file format in whatever way possible. While there is still
81 work to be done (see the TODO file), libpng should cover the
82 majority of the needs of its users.
84 Libpng uses zlib for its compression and decompression of PNG files.
85 Further information about zlib, and the latest version of zlib, can
86 be found at the zlib home page, <http://www.info-zip.org/pub/infozip/zlib/>.
87 The zlib compression utility is a general purpose utility that is
88 useful for more than PNG files, and can be used without libpng.
89 See the documentation delivered with zlib for more details.
90 You can usually find the source files for the zlib utility wherever you
91 find the libpng source files.
93 Libpng is thread safe, provided the threads are using different
94 instances of the structures. Each thread should have its own
95 png_struct and png_info instances, and thus its own image.
96 Libpng does not protect itself against two threads using the
97 same instance of a structure.
101 There are two main structures that are important to libpng, png_struct
102 and png_info. Both are internal structures that are no longer exposed
103 in the libpng interface (as of libpng 1.5.0).
105 The png_info structure is designed to provide information about the
106 PNG file. At one time, the fields of png_info were intended to be
107 directly accessible to the user. However, this tended to cause problems
108 with applications using dynamically loaded libraries, and as a result
109 a set of interface functions for png_info (the png_get_*() and png_set_*()
110 functions) was developed, and direct access to the png_info fields was
113 The png_struct structure is the object used by the library to decode a
114 single image. As of 1.5.0 this structure is also not exposed.
116 Almost all libpng APIs require a pointer to a png_struct as the first argument.
117 Many (in particular the png_set and png_get APIs) also require a pointer
118 to png_info as the second argument. Some application visible macros
119 defined in png.h designed for basic data access (reading and writing
120 integers in the PNG format) don't take a png_info pointer, but it's almost
121 always safe to assume that a (png_struct*) has to be passed to call an API
124 You can have more than one png_info structure associated with an image,
125 as illustrated in pngtest.c, one for information valid prior to the
126 IDAT chunks and another (called "end_info" below) for things after them.
128 The png.h header file is an invaluable reference for programming with libpng.
129 And while I'm on the topic, make sure you include the libpng header file:
133 and also (as of libpng-1.5.0) the zlib header file, if you need it:
139 The png.h header file defines a number of integral types used by the
140 APIs. Most of these are fairly obvious; for example types corresponding
141 to integers of particular sizes and types for passing color values.
143 One exception is how non-integral numbers are handled. For application
144 convenience most APIs that take such numbers have C (double) arguments,
145 however internally PNG, and libpng, use 32 bit signed integers and encode
146 the value by multiplying by 100,000. As of libpng 1.5.0 a convenience
147 macro PNG_FP_1 is defined in png.h along with a type (png_fixed_point)
148 which is simply (png_int_32).
150 All APIs that take (double) arguments also have a matching API that
151 takes the corresponding fixed point integer arguments. The fixed point
152 API has the same name as the floating point one with "_fixed" appended.
153 The actual range of values permitted in the APIs is frequently less than
154 the full range of (png_fixed_point) (-21474 to +21474). When APIs require
155 a non-negative argument the type is recorded as png_uint_32 above. Consult
156 the header file and the text below for more information.
158 Special care must be take with sCAL chunk handling because the chunk itself
159 uses non-integral values encoded as strings containing decimal floating point
160 numbers. See the comments in the header file.
164 The main header file function declarations are frequently protected by C
165 preprocessing directives of the form:
167 #ifdef PNG_feature_SUPPORTED
171 #ifdef PNG_feature_SUPPORTED
175 The library can be built without support for these APIs, although a
176 standard build will have all implemented APIs. Application programs
177 should check the feature macros before using an API for maximum
178 portability. From libpng 1.5.0 the feature macros set during the build
179 of libpng are recorded in the header file "pnglibconf.h" and this file
180 is always included by png.h.
182 If you don't need to change the library configuration from the default, skip to
183 the next section ("Reading").
185 Notice that some of the makefiles in the 'scripts' directory and (in 1.5.0) all
186 of the build project files in the 'projects' directory simply copy
187 scripts/pnglibconf.h.prebuilt to pnglibconf.h. This means that these build
188 systems do not permit easy auto-configuration of the library - they only
189 support the default configuration.
191 The easiest way to make minor changes to the libpng configuration when
192 auto-configuration is supported is to add definitions to the command line
193 using (typically) CPPFLAGS. For example:
195 CPPFLAGS=-DPNG_NO_FLOATING_ARITHMETIC
197 will change the internal libpng math implementation for gamma correction and
198 other arithmetic calculations to fixed point, avoiding the need for fast
199 floating point support. The result can be seen in the generated pnglibconf.h -
200 make sure it contains the changed feature macro setting.
202 If you need to make more extensive configuration changes - more than one or two
203 feature macro settings - you can either add -DPNG_USER_CONFIG to the build
204 command line and put a list of feature macro settings in pngusr.h or you can set
205 DFA_XTRA (a makefile variable) to a file containing the same information in the
206 form of 'option' settings.
208 A. Changing pnglibconf.h
210 A variety of methods exist to build libpng. Not all of these support
211 reconfiguration of pnglibconf.h. To reconfigure pnglibconf.h it must either be
212 rebuilt from scripts/pnglibconf.dfa using awk or it must be edited by hand.
214 Hand editing is achieved by copying scripts/pnglibconf.h.prebuilt to
215 pnglibconf.h and changing the lines defining the supported features, paying
216 very close attention to the 'option' information in scripts/pnglibconf.dfa
217 that describes those features and their requirements. This is easy to get
220 B. Configuration using DFA_XTRA
222 Rebuilding from pnglibconf.dfa is easy if a functioning 'awk', or a later
223 variant such as 'nawk' or 'gawk', is available. The configure build will
224 automatically find an appropriate awk and build pnglibconf.h.
225 The scripts/pnglibconf.mak file contains a set of make rules for doing the
226 same thing if configure is not used, and many of the makefiles in the scripts
227 directory use this approach.
229 When rebuilding simply write a new file containing changed options and set
230 DFA_XTRA to the name of this file. This causes the build to append the new file
231 to the end of scripts/pnglibconf.dfa. The pngusr.dfa file should contain lines
232 of the following forms:
236 This turns all optional features off. Include it at the start of pngusr.dfa to
237 make it easier to build a minimal configuration. You will need to turn at least
238 some features on afterward to enable either reading or writing code, or both.
243 Enable or disable a single feature. This will automatically enable other
244 features required by a feature that is turned on or disable other features that
245 require a feature which is turned off. Conflicting settings will cause an error
246 message to be emitted by awk.
248 setting feature default value
250 Changes the default value of setting 'feature' to 'value'. There are a small
251 number of settings listed at the top of pnglibconf.h, they are documented in the
252 source code. Most of these values have performance implications for the library
253 but most of them have no visible effect on the API. Some can also be overridden
256 This method of building a customized pnglibconf.h is illustrated in
257 contrib/pngminim/*. See the "$(PNGCONF):" target in the makefile and
258 pngusr.dfa in these directories.
260 C. Configuration using PNG_USR_CONFIG
262 If -DPNG_USR_CONFIG is added to the CFLAGS when pnglibconf.h is built the file
263 pngusr.h will automatically be included before the options in
264 scripts/pnglibconf.dfa are processed. Your pngusr.h file should contain only
265 macro definitions turning features on or off or setting settings.
267 Apart from the global setting "everything = off" all the options listed above
268 can be set using macros in pngusr.h:
270 #define PNG_feature_SUPPORTED
276 #define PNG_NO_feature
282 #define PNG_feature value
286 setting feature default value
288 Notice that in both cases, pngusr.dfa and pngusr.h, the contents of the
289 pngusr file you supply override the contents of scripts/pnglibconf.dfa
291 If confusing or incomprehensible behavior results it is possible to
292 examine the intermediate file pnglibconf.dfn to find the full set of
293 dependency information for each setting and option. Simply locate the
294 feature in the file and read the C comments that precede it.
296 This method is also illustrated in the contrib/pngminim/* makefiles and
301 We'll now walk you through the possible functions to call when reading
302 in a PNG file sequentially, briefly explaining the syntax and purpose
303 of each one. See example.c and png.h for more detail. While
304 progressive reading is covered in the next section, you will still
305 need some of the functions discussed in this section to read a PNG
310 You will want to do the I/O initialization(*) before you get into libpng,
311 so if it doesn't work, you don't have much to undo. Of course, you
312 will also want to insure that you are, in fact, dealing with a PNG
313 file. Libpng provides a simple check to see if a file is a PNG file.
314 To use it, pass in the first 1 to 8 bytes of the file to the function
315 png_sig_cmp(), and it will return 0 (false) if the bytes match the
316 corresponding bytes of the PNG signature, or nonzero (true) otherwise.
317 Of course, the more bytes you pass in, the greater the accuracy of the
320 If you are intending to keep the file pointer open for use in libpng,
321 you must ensure you don't read more than 8 bytes from the beginning
322 of the file, and you also have to make a call to png_set_sig_bytes_read()
323 with the number of bytes you read from the beginning. Libpng will
324 then only check the bytes (if any) that your program didn't read.
326 (*): If you are not using the standard I/O functions, you will need
327 to replace them with custom functions. See the discussion under
331 FILE *fp = fopen(file_name, "rb");
337 fread(header, 1, number, fp);
338 is_png = !png_sig_cmp(header, 0, number);
346 Next, png_struct and png_info need to be allocated and initialized. In
347 order to ensure that the size of these structures is correct even with a
348 dynamically linked libpng, there are functions to initialize and
349 allocate the structures. We also pass the library version, optional
350 pointers to error handling functions, and a pointer to a data struct for
351 use by the error functions, if necessary (the pointer and functions can
352 be NULL if the default error handlers are to be used). See the section
353 on Changes to Libpng below regarding the old initialization functions.
354 The structure allocation functions quietly return NULL if they fail to
355 create the structure, so your application should check for that.
357 png_structp png_ptr = png_create_read_struct
358 (PNG_LIBPNG_VER_STRING, (png_voidp)user_error_ptr,
359 user_error_fn, user_warning_fn);
364 png_infop info_ptr = png_create_info_struct(png_ptr);
368 png_destroy_read_struct(&png_ptr,
369 (png_infopp)NULL, (png_infopp)NULL);
373 If you want to use your own memory allocation routines,
374 use a libpng that was built with PNG_USER_MEM_SUPPORTED defined, and use
375 png_create_read_struct_2() instead of png_create_read_struct():
377 png_structp png_ptr = png_create_read_struct_2
378 (PNG_LIBPNG_VER_STRING, (png_voidp)user_error_ptr,
379 user_error_fn, user_warning_fn, (png_voidp)
380 user_mem_ptr, user_malloc_fn, user_free_fn);
382 The error handling routines passed to png_create_read_struct()
383 and the memory alloc/free routines passed to png_create_struct_2()
384 are only necessary if you are not using the libpng supplied error
385 handling and memory alloc/free functions.
387 When libpng encounters an error, it expects to longjmp back
388 to your routine. Therefore, you will need to call setjmp and pass
389 your png_jmpbuf(png_ptr). If you read the file from different
390 routines, you will need to update the longjmp buffer every time you enter
391 a new routine that will call a png_*() function.
393 See your documentation of setjmp/longjmp for your compiler for more
394 information on setjmp/longjmp. See the discussion on libpng error
395 handling in the Customizing Libpng section below for more information
396 on the libpng error handling. If an error occurs, and libpng longjmp's
397 back to your setjmp, you will want to call png_destroy_read_struct() to
400 if (setjmp(png_jmpbuf(png_ptr)))
402 png_destroy_read_struct(&png_ptr, &info_ptr,
408 Pass (png_infopp)NULL instead of &end_info if you didn't create
409 an end_info structure.
411 If you would rather avoid the complexity of setjmp/longjmp issues,
412 you can compile libpng with PNG_NO_SETJMP, in which case
413 errors will result in a call to PNG_ABORT() which defaults to abort().
415 You can #define PNG_ABORT() to a function that does something
416 more useful than abort(), as long as your function does not
419 Now you need to set up the input code. The default for libpng is to
420 use the C function fread(). If you use this, you will need to pass a
421 valid FILE * in the function png_init_io(). Be sure that the file is
422 opened in binary mode. If you wish to handle reading data in another
423 way, you need not call the png_init_io() function, but you must then
424 implement the libpng I/O methods discussed in the Customizing Libpng
427 png_init_io(png_ptr, fp);
429 If you had previously opened the file and read any of the signature from
430 the beginning in order to see if this was a PNG file, you need to let
431 libpng know that there are some bytes missing from the start of the file.
433 png_set_sig_bytes(png_ptr, number);
435 You can change the zlib compression buffer size to be used while
436 reading compressed data with
438 png_set_compression_buffer_size(png_ptr, buffer_size);
440 where the default size is 8192 bytes. Note that the buffer size
441 is changed immediately and the buffer is reallocated immediately,
442 instead of setting a flag to be acted upon later.
444 If you want CRC errors to be handled in a different manner than
447 png_set_crc_action(png_ptr, crit_action, ancil_action);
449 The values for png_set_crc_action() say how libpng is to handle CRC errors in
450 ancillary and critical chunks, and whether to use the data contained
451 therein. Note that it is impossible to "discard" data in a critical
454 Choices for (int) crit_action are
455 PNG_CRC_DEFAULT 0 error/quit
456 PNG_CRC_ERROR_QUIT 1 error/quit
457 PNG_CRC_WARN_USE 3 warn/use data
458 PNG_CRC_QUIET_USE 4 quiet/use data
459 PNG_CRC_NO_CHANGE 5 use the current value
461 Choices for (int) ancil_action are
462 PNG_CRC_DEFAULT 0 error/quit
463 PNG_CRC_ERROR_QUIT 1 error/quit
464 PNG_CRC_WARN_DISCARD 2 warn/discard data
465 PNG_CRC_WARN_USE 3 warn/use data
466 PNG_CRC_QUIET_USE 4 quiet/use data
467 PNG_CRC_NO_CHANGE 5 use the current value
469 Setting up callback code
471 You can set up a callback function to handle any unknown chunks in the
472 input stream. You must supply the function
474 read_chunk_callback(png_structp png_ptr,
475 png_unknown_chunkp chunk);
477 /* The unknown chunk structure contains your
478 chunk data, along with similar data for any other
485 /* Note that libpng has already taken care of
488 /* put your code here. Search for your chunk in the
489 unknown chunk structure, process it, and return one
492 return (-n); /* chunk had an error */
493 return (0); /* did not recognize */
494 return (n); /* success */
497 (You can give your function another name that you like instead of
498 "read_chunk_callback")
500 To inform libpng about your function, use
502 png_set_read_user_chunk_fn(png_ptr, user_chunk_ptr,
503 read_chunk_callback);
505 This names not only the callback function, but also a user pointer that
506 you can retrieve with
508 png_get_user_chunk_ptr(png_ptr);
510 If you call the png_set_read_user_chunk_fn() function, then all unknown
511 chunks will be saved when read, in case your callback function will need
512 one or more of them. This behavior can be changed with the
513 png_set_keep_unknown_chunks() function, described below.
515 At this point, you can set up a callback function that will be
516 called after each row has been read, which you can use to control
517 a progress meter or the like. It's demonstrated in pngtest.c.
518 You must supply a function
520 void read_row_callback(png_structp png_ptr,
521 png_uint_32 row, int pass);
523 /* put your code here */
526 (You can give it another name that you like instead of "read_row_callback")
528 To inform libpng about your function, use
530 png_set_read_status_fn(png_ptr, read_row_callback);
532 When this function is called the row has already been completely processed and
533 the 'row' and 'pass' refer to the next row to be handled. For the
534 non-interlaced case the row that was just handled is simply one less than the
535 passed in row number, and pass will always be 0. For the interlaced case the
536 same applies unless the row value is 0, in which case the row just handled was
537 the last one from one of the preceding passes. Because interlacing may skip a
538 pass you cannot be sure that the preceding pass is just 'pass-1', if you really
539 need to know what the last pass is record (row,pass) from the callback and use
540 the last recorded value each time.
542 As with the user transform you can find the output row using the
543 PNG_ROW_FROM_PASS_ROW macro.
545 Unknown-chunk handling
547 Now you get to set the way the library processes unknown chunks in the
548 input PNG stream. Both known and unknown chunks will be read. Normal
549 behavior is that known chunks will be parsed into information in
550 various info_ptr members while unknown chunks will be discarded. This
551 behavior can be wasteful if your application will never use some known
552 chunk types. To change this, you can call:
554 png_set_keep_unknown_chunks(png_ptr, keep,
555 chunk_list, num_chunks);
556 keep - 0: default unknown chunk handling
557 1: ignore; do not keep
558 2: keep only if safe-to-copy
559 3: keep even if unsafe-to-copy
561 You can use these definitions:
562 PNG_HANDLE_CHUNK_AS_DEFAULT 0
563 PNG_HANDLE_CHUNK_NEVER 1
564 PNG_HANDLE_CHUNK_IF_SAFE 2
565 PNG_HANDLE_CHUNK_ALWAYS 3
567 chunk_list - list of chunks affected (a byte string,
568 five bytes per chunk, NULL or '\0' if
571 num_chunks - number of chunks affected; if 0, all
572 unknown chunks are affected. If nonzero,
573 only the chunks in the list are affected
575 Unknown chunks declared in this way will be saved as raw data onto a
576 list of png_unknown_chunk structures. If a chunk that is normally
577 known to libpng is named in the list, it will be handled as unknown,
578 according to the "keep" directive. If a chunk is named in successive
579 instances of png_set_keep_unknown_chunks(), the final instance will
580 take precedence. The IHDR and IEND chunks should not be named in
581 chunk_list; if they are, libpng will process them normally anyway.
582 If you know that your application will never make use of some particular
583 chunks, use PNG_HANDLE_CHUNK_NEVER (or 1) as demonstrated below.
585 Here is an example of the usage of png_set_keep_unknown_chunks(),
586 where the private "vpAg" chunk will later be processed by a user chunk
589 png_byte vpAg[5]={118, 112, 65, 103, (png_byte) '\0'};
591 #if defined(PNG_UNKNOWN_CHUNKS_SUPPORTED)
592 png_byte unused_chunks[]=
594 104, 73, 83, 84, (png_byte) '\0', /* hIST */
595 105, 84, 88, 116, (png_byte) '\0', /* iTXt */
596 112, 67, 65, 76, (png_byte) '\0', /* pCAL */
597 115, 67, 65, 76, (png_byte) '\0', /* sCAL */
598 115, 80, 76, 84, (png_byte) '\0', /* sPLT */
599 116, 73, 77, 69, (png_byte) '\0', /* tIME */
605 #if defined(PNG_UNKNOWN_CHUNKS_SUPPORTED)
606 /* ignore all unknown chunks: */
607 png_set_keep_unknown_chunks(read_ptr, 1, NULL, 0);
609 /* except for vpAg: */
610 png_set_keep_unknown_chunks(read_ptr, 2, vpAg, 1);
612 /* also ignore unused known chunks: */
613 png_set_keep_unknown_chunks(read_ptr, 1, unused_chunks,
614 (int)sizeof(unused_chunks)/5);
619 The PNG specification allows the width and height of an image to be as
620 large as 2^31-1 (0x7fffffff), or about 2.147 billion rows and columns.
621 Since very few applications really need to process such large images,
622 we have imposed an arbitrary 1-million limit on rows and columns.
623 Larger images will be rejected immediately with a png_error() call. If
624 you wish to change this limit, you can use
626 png_set_user_limits(png_ptr, width_max, height_max);
628 to set your own limits, or use width_max = height_max = 0x7fffffffL
629 to allow all valid dimensions (libpng may reject some very large images
630 anyway because of potential buffer overflow conditions).
632 You should put this statement after you create the PNG structure and
633 before calling png_read_info(), png_read_png(), or png_process_data().
635 When writing a PNG datastream, put this statement before calling
636 png_write_info() or png_write_png().
638 If you need to retrieve the limits that are being applied, use
640 width_max = png_get_user_width_max(png_ptr);
641 height_max = png_get_user_height_max(png_ptr);
643 The PNG specification sets no limit on the number of ancillary chunks
644 allowed in a PNG datastream. You can impose a limit on the total number
645 of sPLT, tEXt, iTXt, zTXt, and unknown chunks that will be stored, with
647 png_set_chunk_cache_max(png_ptr, user_chunk_cache_max);
649 where 0x7fffffffL means unlimited. You can retrieve this limit with
651 chunk_cache_max = png_get_chunk_cache_max(png_ptr);
653 This limit also applies to the number of buffers that can be allocated
654 by png_decompress_chunk() while decompressing iTXt, zTXt, and iCCP chunks.
656 You can also set a limit on the amount of memory that a compressed chunk
657 other than IDAT can occupy, with
659 png_set_chunk_malloc_max(png_ptr, user_chunk_malloc_max);
661 and you can retrieve the limit with
663 chunk_malloc_max = png_get_chunk_malloc_max(png_ptr);
665 Any chunks that would cause either of these limits to be exceeded will
668 Information about your system
670 If you intend to display the PNG or to incorporate it in other image data you
671 need to tell libpng information about your display or drawing surface so that
672 libpng can convert the values in the image to match the display.
674 From libpng-1.5.4 this information can be set before reading the PNG file
675 header. In earlier versions png_set_gamma() existed but behaved incorrectly if
676 called before the PNG file header had been read and png_set_alpha_mode() did not
679 If you need to support versions prior to libpng-1.5.4 test the version number
680 as illustrated below using "PNG_LIBPNG_VER >= 10504" and follow the procedures
681 described in the appropriate manual page.
683 You give libpng the encoding expected by your system expressed as a 'gamma'
684 value. You can also specify a default encoding for the PNG file in
685 case the required information is missing from the file. By default libpng
686 assumes that the PNG data matches your system, to keep this default call:
688 png_set_gamma(png_ptr, screen_gamma, 1/screen_gamma/*file gamma*/);
690 or you can use the fixed point equivalent:
692 png_set_gamma_fixed(png_ptr, PNG_FP_1*screen_gamma, PNG_FP_1/screen_gamma);
694 If you don't know the gamma for your system it is probably 2.2 - a good
695 approximation to the IEC standard for display systems (sRGB). If images are
696 too contrasty or washed out you got the value wrong - check your system
699 Many systems permit the system gamma to be changed via a lookup table in the
700 display driver, a few systems, including older Macs, change the response by
701 default. As of 1.5.4 three special values are available to handle common
704 PNG_DEFAULT_sRGB: Indicates that the system conforms to the IEC 61966-2-1
705 standard. This matches almost all systems.
706 PNG_GAMMA_MAC_18: Indicates that the system is an older (pre Mac OS 10.6)
707 Apple Macintosh system with the default settings.
708 PNG_GAMMA_LINEAR: Just the fixed point value for 1.0 - indicates that the
709 system expects data with no gamma encoding.
711 You would use the linear (unencoded) value if you need to process the pixel
712 values further because this avoids the need to decode and reencode each
713 component value whenever arithmetic is performed. A lot of graphics software
714 uses linear values for this reason, often with higher precision component values
715 to preserve overall accuracy.
717 The second thing you may need to tell libpng about is how your system handles
718 alpha channel information. Some, but not all, PNG files contain an alpha
719 channel. To display these files correctly you need to compose the data onto a
720 suitable background, as described in the PNG specification.
722 Libpng only supports composing onto a single color (using png_set_background;
723 see below). Otherwise you must do the composition yourself and, in this case,
724 you may need to call png_set_alpha_mode:
726 #if PNG_LIBPNG_VER >= 10504
727 png_set_alpha_mode(png_ptr, mode, screen_gamma);
729 png_set_gamma(png_ptr, screen_gamma, 1.0/screen_gamma);
732 The screen_gamma value is the same as the argument to png_set_gamma; however,
733 how it affects the output depends on the mode. png_set_alpha_mode() sets the
734 file gamma default to 1/screen_gamma, so normally you don't need to call
735 png_set_gamma. If you need different defaults call png_set_gamma() before
736 png_set_alpha_mode() - if you call it after it will override the settings made
737 by png_set_alpha_mode().
739 The mode is as follows:
741 PNG_ALPHA_PNG: The data is encoded according to the PNG specification. Red,
742 green and blue, or gray, components are gamma encoded color
743 values and are not premultiplied by the alpha value. The
744 alpha value is a linear measure of the contribution of the
745 pixel to the corresponding final output pixel.
747 You should normally use this format if you intend to perform
748 color correction on the color values; most, maybe all, color
749 correction software has no handling for the alpha channel and,
750 anyway, the math to handle pre-multiplied component values is
751 unnecessarily complex.
753 Before you do any arithmetic on the component values you need
754 to remove the gamma encoding and multiply out the alpha
755 channel. See the PNG specification for more detail. It is
756 important to note that when an image with an alpha channel is
757 scaled, linear encoded, pre-multiplied component values must
760 The remaining modes assume you don't need to do any further color correction or
761 that if you do, your color correction software knows all about alpha (it
764 PNG_ALPHA_STANDARD: The data libpng produces
765 is encoded in the standard way
766 assumed by most correctly written graphics software.
767 The gamma encoding will be removed by libpng and the
768 linear component values will be pre-multiplied by the
771 With this format the final image must be re-encoded to
772 match the display gamma before the image is displayed.
773 If your system doesn't do that, yet still seems to
774 perform arithmetic on the pixels without decoding them,
775 it is broken - check out the modes below.
777 With PNG_ALPHA_STANDARD libpng always produces linear
778 component values, whatever screen_gamma you supply. The
779 screen_gamma value is, however, used as a default for
780 the file gamma if the PNG file has no gamma information.
782 If you call png_set_gamma() after png_set_alpha_mode() you
783 will override the linear encoding. Instead the
784 pre-multiplied pixel values will be gamma encoded but
785 the alpha channel will still be linear. This may
786 actually match the requirements of some broken software,
789 While linear 8-bit data is often used it has
790 insufficient precision for any image with a reasonable
791 dynamic range. To avoid problems, and if your software
792 supports it, use png_set_expand_16() to force all
793 components to 16 bits.
795 PNG_ALPHA_OPTIMIZED: This mode is the same
796 as PNG_ALPHA_STANDARD except that
797 completely opaque pixels are gamma encoded according to
798 the screen_gamma value. Pixels with alpha less than 1.0
799 will still have linear components.
801 Use this format if you have control over your
802 compositing software and do don't do other arithmetic
803 (such as scaling) on the data you get from libpng. Your
804 compositing software can simply copy opaque pixels to
805 the output but still has linear values for the
808 In normal compositing, where the alpha channel encodes
809 partial pixel coverage (as opposed to broad area
810 translucency), the inaccuracies of the 8-bit
811 representation of non-opaque pixels are irrelevant.
813 You can also try this format if your software is broken;
814 it might look better.
816 PNG_ALPHA_BROKEN: This is PNG_ALPHA_STANDARD;
817 however, all component values,
818 including the alpha channel are gamma encoded. This is
819 an appropriate format to try if your software, or more
820 likely hardware, is totally broken, i.e., if it performs
821 linear arithmetic directly on gamma encoded values.
823 In most cases of broken software or hardware the bug in the final display
824 manifests as a subtle halo around composited parts of the image. You may not
825 even perceive this as a halo; the composited part of the image may simply appear
826 separate from the background, as though it had been cut out of paper and pasted
829 If you don't have to deal with bugs in software or hardware, or if you can fix
830 them, there are three recommended ways of using png_set_alpha_mode():
832 png_set_alpha_mode(png_ptr, PNG_ALPHA_PNG,
835 You can do color correction on the result (libpng does not currently
836 support color correction internally). When you handle the alpha channel
837 you need to undo the gamma encoding and multiply out the alpha.
839 png_set_alpha_mode(png_ptr, PNG_ALPHA_STANDARD,
841 png_set_expand_16(png_ptr);
843 If you are using the high level interface, don't call png_set_expand_16();
844 instead pass PNG_TRANSFORM_EXPAND_16 to the interface.
846 With this mode you can't do color correction, but you can do arithmetic,
847 including composition and scaling, on the data without further processing.
849 png_set_alpha_mode(png_ptr, PNG_ALPHA_OPTIMIZED,
852 You can avoid the expansion to 16-bit components with this mode, but you
853 lose the ability to scale the image or perform other linear arithmetic.
854 All you can do is compose the result onto a matching output. Since this
855 mode is libpng-specific you also need to write your own composition
858 If you don't need, or can't handle, the alpha channel you can call
859 png_set_background() to remove it by compositing against a fixed color. Don't
860 call png_set_strip_alpha() to do this - it will leave spurious pixel values in
861 transparent parts of this image.
863 png_set_background(png_ptr, &background_color,
864 PNG_BACKGROUND_GAMMA_SCREEN, 0, 1);
866 The background_color is an RGB or grayscale value according to the data format
867 libpng will produce for you. Because you don't yet know the format of the PNG
868 file, if you call png_set_background at this point you must arrange for the
869 format produced by libpng to always have 8-bit or 16-bit components and then
870 store the color as an 8-bit or 16-bit color as appropriate. The color contains
871 separate gray and RGB component values, so you can let libpng produce gray or
872 RGB output according to the input format, but low bit depth grayscale images
873 must always be converted to at least 8-bit format. (Even though low bit depth
874 grayscale images can't have an alpha channel they can have a transparent
877 You set the transforms you need later, either as flags to the high level
878 interface or libpng API calls for the low level interface. For reference the
879 settings and API calls required are:
882 PNG_TRANSFORM_SCALE_16 | PNG_EXPAND
883 png_set_expand(png_ptr); png_set_scale_16(png_ptr);
885 If you must get exactly the same inaccurate results
886 produced by default in versions prior to libpng-1.5.4,
887 use PNG_TRANSFORM_STRIP_16 and png_set_strip_16(png_ptr)
891 PNG_TRANSFORM_EXPAND_16
892 png_set_expand_16(png_ptr);
894 In either case palette image data will be expanded to RGB. If you just want
895 color data you can add PNG_TRANSFORM_GRAY_TO_RGB or png_set_gray_to_rgb(png_ptr)
898 Calling png_set_background before the PNG file header is read will not work
899 prior to libpng-1.5.4. Because the failure may result in unexpected warnings or
900 errors it is therefore much safer to call png_set_background after the head has
901 been read. Unfortunately this means that prior to libpng-1.5.4 it cannot be
902 used with the high level interface.
904 The high-level read interface
906 At this point there are two ways to proceed; through the high-level
907 read interface, or through a sequence of low-level read operations.
908 You can use the high-level interface if (a) you are willing to read
909 the entire image into memory, and (b) the input transformations
910 you want to do are limited to the following set:
912 PNG_TRANSFORM_IDENTITY No transformation
913 PNG_TRANSFORM_SCALE_16 Strip 16-bit samples to
915 PNG_TRANSFORM_STRIP_16 Chop 16-bit samples to
916 8-bit less accurately
917 PNG_TRANSFORM_STRIP_ALPHA Discard the alpha channel
918 PNG_TRANSFORM_PACKING Expand 1, 2 and 4-bit
920 PNG_TRANSFORM_PACKSWAP Change order of packed
922 PNG_TRANSFORM_EXPAND Perform set_expand()
923 PNG_TRANSFORM_INVERT_MONO Invert monochrome images
924 PNG_TRANSFORM_SHIFT Normalize pixels to the
926 PNG_TRANSFORM_BGR Flip RGB to BGR, RGBA
928 PNG_TRANSFORM_SWAP_ALPHA Flip RGBA to ARGB or GA
930 PNG_TRANSFORM_INVERT_ALPHA Change alpha from opacity
932 PNG_TRANSFORM_SWAP_ENDIAN Byte-swap 16-bit samples
933 PNG_TRANSFORM_GRAY_TO_RGB Expand grayscale samples
934 to RGB (or GA to RGBA)
935 PNG_TRANSFORM_EXPAND_16 Expand samples to 16 bits
937 (This excludes setting a background color, doing gamma transformation,
938 quantizing, and setting filler.) If this is the case, simply do this:
940 png_read_png(png_ptr, info_ptr, png_transforms, NULL)
942 where png_transforms is an integer containing the bitwise OR of some
943 set of transformation flags. This call is equivalent to png_read_info(),
944 followed the set of transformations indicated by the transform mask,
945 then png_read_image(), and finally png_read_end().
947 (The final parameter of this call is not yet used. Someday it might point
948 to transformation parameters required by some future input transform.)
950 You must use png_transforms and not call any png_set_transform() functions
951 when you use png_read_png().
953 After you have called png_read_png(), you can retrieve the image data
956 row_pointers = png_get_rows(png_ptr, info_ptr);
958 where row_pointers is an array of pointers to the pixel data for each row:
960 png_bytep row_pointers[height];
962 If you know your image size and pixel size ahead of time, you can allocate
963 row_pointers prior to calling png_read_png() with
965 if (height > PNG_UINT_32_MAX/png_sizeof(png_byte))
967 "Image is too tall to process in memory");
969 if (width > PNG_UINT_32_MAX/pixel_size)
971 "Image is too wide to process in memory");
973 row_pointers = png_malloc(png_ptr,
974 height*png_sizeof(png_bytep));
976 for (int i=0; i<height, i++)
977 row_pointers[i]=NULL; /* security precaution */
979 for (int i=0; i<height, i++)
980 row_pointers[i]=png_malloc(png_ptr,
983 png_set_rows(png_ptr, info_ptr, &row_pointers);
985 Alternatively you could allocate your image in one big block and define
986 row_pointers[i] to point into the proper places in your block.
988 If you use png_set_rows(), the application is responsible for freeing
989 row_pointers (and row_pointers[i], if they were separately allocated).
991 If you don't allocate row_pointers ahead of time, png_read_png() will
992 do it, and it'll be free'ed by libpng when you call png_destroy_*().
994 The low-level read interface
996 If you are going the low-level route, you are now ready to read all
997 the file information up to the actual image data. You do this with a
998 call to png_read_info().
1000 png_read_info(png_ptr, info_ptr);
1002 This will process all chunks up to but not including the image data.
1004 This also copies some of the data from the PNG file into the decode structure
1005 for use in later transformations. Important information copied in is:
1007 1) The PNG file gamma from the gAMA chunk. This overwrites the default value
1008 provided by an earlier call to png_set_gamma or png_set_alpha_mode.
1010 2) Prior to libpng-1.5.4 the background color from a bKGd chunk. This
1011 damages the information provided by an earlier call to png_set_background
1012 resulting in unexpected behavior. Libpng-1.5.4 no longer does this.
1014 3) The number of significant bits in each component value. Libpng uses this to
1015 optimize gamma handling by reducing the internal lookup table sizes.
1017 4) The transparent color information from a tRNS chunk. This can be modified by
1018 a later call to png_set_tRNS.
1020 Querying the info structure
1022 Functions are used to get the information from the info_ptr once it
1023 has been read. Note that these fields may not be completely filled
1024 in until png_read_end() has read the chunk data following the image.
1026 png_get_IHDR(png_ptr, info_ptr, &width, &height,
1027 &bit_depth, &color_type, &interlace_type,
1028 &compression_type, &filter_method);
1030 width - holds the width of the image
1031 in pixels (up to 2^31).
1033 height - holds the height of the image
1034 in pixels (up to 2^31).
1036 bit_depth - holds the bit depth of one of the
1037 image channels. (valid values are
1038 1, 2, 4, 8, 16 and depend also on
1039 the color_type. See also
1040 significant bits (sBIT) below).
1042 color_type - describes which color/alpha channels
1045 (bit depths 1, 2, 4, 8, 16)
1046 PNG_COLOR_TYPE_GRAY_ALPHA
1048 PNG_COLOR_TYPE_PALETTE
1049 (bit depths 1, 2, 4, 8)
1052 PNG_COLOR_TYPE_RGB_ALPHA
1055 PNG_COLOR_MASK_PALETTE
1056 PNG_COLOR_MASK_COLOR
1057 PNG_COLOR_MASK_ALPHA
1059 interlace_type - (PNG_INTERLACE_NONE or
1060 PNG_INTERLACE_ADAM7)
1062 compression_type - (must be PNG_COMPRESSION_TYPE_BASE
1065 filter_method - (must be PNG_FILTER_TYPE_BASE
1066 for PNG 1.0, and can also be
1067 PNG_INTRAPIXEL_DIFFERENCING if
1068 the PNG datastream is embedded in
1069 a MNG-1.0 datastream)
1071 Any or all of interlace_type, compression_type, or
1072 filter_method can be NULL if you are
1073 not interested in their values.
1075 Note that png_get_IHDR() returns 32-bit data into
1076 the application's width and height variables.
1077 This is an unsafe situation if these are 16-bit
1078 variables. In such situations, the
1079 png_get_image_width() and png_get_image_height()
1080 functions described below are safer.
1082 width = png_get_image_width(png_ptr,
1085 height = png_get_image_height(png_ptr,
1088 bit_depth = png_get_bit_depth(png_ptr,
1091 color_type = png_get_color_type(png_ptr,
1094 interlace_type = png_get_interlace_type(png_ptr,
1097 compression_type = png_get_compression_type(png_ptr,
1100 filter_method = png_get_filter_type(png_ptr,
1103 channels = png_get_channels(png_ptr, info_ptr);
1105 channels - number of channels of info for the
1106 color type (valid values are 1 (GRAY,
1107 PALETTE), 2 (GRAY_ALPHA), 3 (RGB),
1108 4 (RGB_ALPHA or RGB + filler byte))
1110 rowbytes = png_get_rowbytes(png_ptr, info_ptr);
1112 rowbytes - number of bytes needed to hold a row
1114 signature = png_get_signature(png_ptr, info_ptr);
1116 signature - holds the signature read from the
1117 file (if any). The data is kept in
1118 the same offset it would be if the
1119 whole signature were read (i.e. if an
1120 application had already read in 4
1121 bytes of signature before starting
1122 libpng, the remaining 4 bytes would
1123 be in signature[4] through signature[7]
1124 (see png_set_sig_bytes())).
1126 These are also important, but their validity depends on whether the chunk
1127 has been read. The png_get_valid(png_ptr, info_ptr, PNG_INFO_<chunk>) and
1128 png_get_<chunk>(png_ptr, info_ptr, ...) functions return non-zero if the
1129 data has been read, or zero if it is missing. The parameters to the
1130 png_get_<chunk> are set directly if they are simple data types, or a
1131 pointer into the info_ptr is returned for any complex types.
1133 png_get_PLTE(png_ptr, info_ptr, &palette,
1136 palette - the palette for the file
1137 (array of png_color)
1139 num_palette - number of entries in the palette
1141 png_get_gAMA(png_ptr, info_ptr, &file_gamma);
1142 png_get_gAMA_fixed(png_ptr, info_ptr, &int_file_gamma);
1144 file_gamma - the gamma at which the file is
1145 written (PNG_INFO_gAMA)
1147 int_file_gamma - 100,000 times the gamma at which the
1150 png_get_cHRM(png_ptr, info_ptr, &white_x, &white_y, &red_x, &red_y,
1151 &green_x, &green_y, &blue_x, &blue_y)
1152 png_get_cHRM_XYZ(png_ptr, info_ptr, &red_X, &red_Y, &red_Z, &green_X,
1153 &green_Y, &green_Z, &blue_X, &blue_Y, &blue_Z)
1154 png_get_cHRM_fixed(png_ptr, info_ptr, &int_white_x, &int_white_y,
1155 &int_red_x, &int_red_y, &int_green_x, &int_green_y,
1156 &int_blue_x, &int_blue_y)
1157 png_get_cHRM_XYZ_fixed(png_ptr, info_ptr, &int_red_X, &int_red_Y,
1158 &int_red_Z, &int_green_X, &int_green_Y, &int_green_Z,
1159 &int_blue_X, &int_blue_Y, &int_blue_Z)
1161 {white,red,green,blue}_{x,y}
1162 A color space encoding specified using the chromaticities
1163 of the end points and the white point. (PNG_INFO_cHRM)
1165 {red,green,blue}_{X,Y,Z}
1166 A color space encoding specified using the encoding end
1167 points - the CIE tristimulus specification of the intended
1168 color of the red, green and blue channels in the PNG RGB
1169 data. The white point is simply the sum of the three end
1170 points. (PNG_INFO_cHRM)
1172 png_get_sRGB(png_ptr, info_ptr, &srgb_intent);
1174 file_srgb_intent - the rendering intent (PNG_INFO_sRGB)
1175 The presence of the sRGB chunk
1176 means that the pixel data is in the
1177 sRGB color space. This chunk also
1178 implies specific values of gAMA and
1181 png_get_iCCP(png_ptr, info_ptr, &name,
1182 &compression_type, &profile, &proflen);
1184 name - The profile name.
1186 compression_type - The compression type; always
1187 PNG_COMPRESSION_TYPE_BASE for PNG 1.0.
1188 You may give NULL to this argument to
1191 profile - International Color Consortium color
1192 profile data. May contain NULs.
1194 proflen - length of profile data in bytes.
1196 png_get_sBIT(png_ptr, info_ptr, &sig_bit);
1198 sig_bit - the number of significant bits for
1199 (PNG_INFO_sBIT) each of the gray,
1200 red, green, and blue channels,
1201 whichever are appropriate for the
1202 given color type (png_color_16)
1204 png_get_tRNS(png_ptr, info_ptr, &trans_alpha,
1205 &num_trans, &trans_color);
1207 trans_alpha - array of alpha (transparency)
1208 entries for palette (PNG_INFO_tRNS)
1210 num_trans - number of transparent entries
1213 trans_color - graylevel or color sample values of
1214 the single transparent color for
1215 non-paletted images (PNG_INFO_tRNS)
1217 png_get_hIST(png_ptr, info_ptr, &hist);
1220 hist - histogram of palette (array of
1223 png_get_tIME(png_ptr, info_ptr, &mod_time);
1225 mod_time - time image was last modified
1228 png_get_bKGD(png_ptr, info_ptr, &background);
1230 background - background color (of type
1231 png_color_16p) (PNG_VALID_bKGD)
1232 valid 16-bit red, green and blue
1233 values, regardless of color_type
1235 num_comments = png_get_text(png_ptr, info_ptr,
1236 &text_ptr, &num_text);
1238 num_comments - number of comments
1240 text_ptr - array of png_text holding image
1243 text_ptr[i].compression - type of compression used
1244 on "text" PNG_TEXT_COMPRESSION_NONE
1245 PNG_TEXT_COMPRESSION_zTXt
1246 PNG_ITXT_COMPRESSION_NONE
1247 PNG_ITXT_COMPRESSION_zTXt
1249 text_ptr[i].key - keyword for comment. Must contain
1252 text_ptr[i].text - text comments for current
1253 keyword. Can be empty.
1255 text_ptr[i].text_length - length of text string,
1256 after decompression, 0 for iTXt
1258 text_ptr[i].itxt_length - length of itxt string,
1259 after decompression, 0 for tEXt/zTXt
1261 text_ptr[i].lang - language of comment (empty
1262 string for unknown).
1264 text_ptr[i].lang_key - keyword in UTF-8
1265 (empty string for unknown).
1267 Note that the itxt_length, lang, and lang_key
1268 members of the text_ptr structure only exist
1269 when the library is built with iTXt chunk support.
1270 Prior to libpng-1.4.0, the default build was
1271 without iTXt chunk support.
1273 num_text - number of comments (same as
1274 num_comments; you can put NULL here
1275 to avoid the duplication)
1277 Note while png_set_text() will accept text, language,
1278 and translated keywords that can be NULL pointers, the
1279 structure returned by png_get_text will always contain
1280 regular zero-terminated C strings. They might be
1281 empty strings but they will never be NULL pointers.
1283 num_spalettes = png_get_sPLT(png_ptr, info_ptr,
1286 num_spalettes - number of sPLT chunks read.
1288 palette_ptr - array of palette structures holding
1289 contents of one or more sPLT chunks
1292 png_get_oFFs(png_ptr, info_ptr, &offset_x, &offset_y,
1295 offset_x - positive offset from the left edge
1296 of the screen (can be negative)
1298 offset_y - positive offset from the top edge
1299 of the screen (can be negative)
1301 unit_type - PNG_OFFSET_PIXEL, PNG_OFFSET_MICROMETER
1303 png_get_pHYs(png_ptr, info_ptr, &res_x, &res_y,
1306 res_x - pixels/unit physical resolution in
1309 res_y - pixels/unit physical resolution in
1312 unit_type - PNG_RESOLUTION_UNKNOWN,
1313 PNG_RESOLUTION_METER
1315 png_get_sCAL(png_ptr, info_ptr, &unit, &width,
1318 unit - physical scale units (an integer)
1320 width - width of a pixel in physical scale units
1322 height - height of a pixel in physical scale units
1323 (width and height are doubles)
1325 png_get_sCAL_s(png_ptr, info_ptr, &unit, &width,
1328 unit - physical scale units (an integer)
1330 width - width of a pixel in physical scale units
1331 (expressed as a string)
1333 height - height of a pixel in physical scale units
1334 (width and height are strings like "2.54")
1336 num_unknown_chunks = png_get_unknown_chunks(png_ptr,
1337 info_ptr, &unknowns)
1339 unknowns - array of png_unknown_chunk
1340 structures holding unknown chunks
1342 unknowns[i].name - name of unknown chunk
1344 unknowns[i].data - data of unknown chunk
1346 unknowns[i].size - size of unknown chunk's data
1348 unknowns[i].location - position of chunk in file
1350 The value of "i" corresponds to the order in which the
1351 chunks were read from the PNG file or inserted with the
1352 png_set_unknown_chunks() function.
1354 The value of "location" is a bitwise "or" of
1356 PNG_HAVE_IHDR (0x01)
1357 PNG_HAVE_PLTE (0x02)
1358 PNG_AFTER_IDAT (0x08)
1360 The data from the pHYs chunk can be retrieved in several convenient
1363 res_x = png_get_x_pixels_per_meter(png_ptr,
1366 res_y = png_get_y_pixels_per_meter(png_ptr,
1369 res_x_and_y = png_get_pixels_per_meter(png_ptr,
1372 res_x = png_get_x_pixels_per_inch(png_ptr,
1375 res_y = png_get_y_pixels_per_inch(png_ptr,
1378 res_x_and_y = png_get_pixels_per_inch(png_ptr,
1381 aspect_ratio = png_get_pixel_aspect_ratio(png_ptr,
1384 Each of these returns 0 [signifying "unknown"] if
1385 the data is not present or if res_x is 0;
1386 res_x_and_y is 0 if res_x != res_y
1388 Note that because of the way the resolutions are
1389 stored internally, the inch conversions won't
1390 come out to exactly even number. For example,
1391 72 dpi is stored as 0.28346 pixels/meter, and
1392 when this is retrieved it is 71.9988 dpi, so
1393 be sure to round the returned value appropriately
1394 if you want to display a reasonable-looking result.
1396 The data from the oFFs chunk can be retrieved in several convenient
1399 x_offset = png_get_x_offset_microns(png_ptr, info_ptr);
1401 y_offset = png_get_y_offset_microns(png_ptr, info_ptr);
1403 x_offset = png_get_x_offset_inches(png_ptr, info_ptr);
1405 y_offset = png_get_y_offset_inches(png_ptr, info_ptr);
1407 Each of these returns 0 [signifying "unknown" if both
1408 x and y are 0] if the data is not present or if the
1409 chunk is present but the unit is the pixel. The
1410 remark about inexact inch conversions applies here
1411 as well, because a value in inches can't always be
1412 converted to microns and back without some loss
1415 For more information, see the
1416 PNG specification for chunk contents. Be careful with trusting
1417 rowbytes, as some of the transformations could increase the space
1418 needed to hold a row (expand, filler, gray_to_rgb, etc.).
1419 See png_read_update_info(), below.
1421 A quick word about text_ptr and num_text. PNG stores comments in
1422 keyword/text pairs, one pair per chunk, with no limit on the number
1423 of text chunks, and a 2^31 byte limit on their size. While there are
1424 suggested keywords, there is no requirement to restrict the use to these
1425 strings. It is strongly suggested that keywords and text be sensible
1426 to humans (that's the point), so don't use abbreviations. Non-printing
1427 symbols are not allowed. See the PNG specification for more details.
1428 There is also no requirement to have text after the keyword.
1430 Keywords should be limited to 79 Latin-1 characters without leading or
1431 trailing spaces, but non-consecutive spaces are allowed within the
1432 keyword. It is possible to have the same keyword any number of times.
1433 The text_ptr is an array of png_text structures, each holding a
1434 pointer to a language string, a pointer to a keyword and a pointer to
1435 a text string. The text string, language code, and translated
1436 keyword may be empty or NULL pointers. The keyword/text
1437 pairs are put into the array in the order that they are received.
1438 However, some or all of the text chunks may be after the image, so, to
1439 make sure you have read all the text chunks, don't mess with these
1440 until after you read the stuff after the image. This will be
1441 mentioned again below in the discussion that goes with png_read_end().
1443 Input transformations
1445 After you've read the header information, you can set up the library
1446 to handle any special transformations of the image data. The various
1447 ways to transform the data will be described in the order that they
1448 should occur. This is important, as some of these change the color
1449 type and/or bit depth of the data, and some others only work on
1450 certain color types and bit depths.
1452 Transformations you request are ignored if they don't have any meaning for a
1453 particular input data format. However some transformations can have an effect
1454 as a result of a previous transformation. If you specify a contradictory set of
1455 transformations, for example both adding and removing the alpha channel, you
1456 cannot predict the final result.
1458 The color used for the transparency values should be supplied in the same
1459 format/depth as the current image data. It is stored in the same format/depth
1460 as the image data in a tRNS chunk, so this is what libpng expects for this data.
1462 The color used for the background value depends on the need_expand argument as
1465 Data will be decoded into the supplied row buffers packed into bytes
1466 unless the library has been told to transform it into another format.
1467 For example, 4 bit/pixel paletted or grayscale data will be returned
1468 2 pixels/byte with the leftmost pixel in the high-order bits of the
1469 byte, unless png_set_packing() is called. 8-bit RGB data will be stored
1470 in RGB RGB RGB format unless png_set_filler() or png_set_add_alpha()
1471 is called to insert filler bytes, either before or after each RGB triplet.
1472 16-bit RGB data will be returned RRGGBB RRGGBB, with the most significant
1473 byte of the color value first, unless png_set_scale_16() is called to
1474 transform it to regular RGB RGB triplets, or png_set_filler() or
1475 png_set_add alpha() is called to insert filler bytes, either before or
1476 after each RRGGBB triplet. Similarly, 8-bit or 16-bit grayscale data can
1477 be modified with png_set_filler(), png_set_add_alpha(), png_set_strip_16(),
1478 or png_set_scale_16().
1480 The following code transforms grayscale images of less than 8 to 8 bits,
1481 changes paletted images to RGB, and adds a full alpha channel if there is
1482 transparency information in a tRNS chunk. This is most useful on
1483 grayscale images with bit depths of 2 or 4 or if there is a multiple-image
1484 viewing application that wishes to treat all images in the same way.
1486 if (color_type == PNG_COLOR_TYPE_PALETTE)
1487 png_set_palette_to_rgb(png_ptr);
1489 if (png_get_valid(png_ptr, info_ptr,
1490 PNG_INFO_tRNS)) png_set_tRNS_to_alpha(png_ptr);
1492 if (color_type == PNG_COLOR_TYPE_GRAY &&
1493 bit_depth < 8) png_set_expand_gray_1_2_4_to_8(png_ptr);
1495 The first two functions are actually aliases for png_set_expand(), added
1496 in libpng version 1.0.4, with the function names expanded to improve code
1497 readability. In some future version they may actually do different
1500 As of libpng version 1.2.9, png_set_expand_gray_1_2_4_to_8() was
1501 added. It expands the sample depth without changing tRNS to alpha.
1503 As of libpng version 1.5.2, png_set_expand_16() was added. It behaves as
1504 png_set_expand(); however, the resultant channels have 16 bits rather than 8.
1505 Use this when the output color or gray channels are made linear to avoid fairly
1506 severe accuracy loss.
1509 png_set_expand_16(png_ptr);
1511 PNG can have files with 16 bits per channel. If you only can handle
1512 8 bits per channel, this will strip the pixels down to 8-bit.
1514 if (bit_depth == 16)
1515 #if PNG_LIBPNG_VER >= 10504
1516 png_set_scale_16(png_ptr);
1518 png_set_strip_16(png_ptr);
1521 (The more accurate "png_set_scale_16()" API became available in libpng version
1524 If you need to process the alpha channel on the image separately from the image
1525 data (for example if you convert it to a bitmap mask) it is possible to have
1526 libpng strip the channel leaving just RGB or gray data:
1528 if (color_type & PNG_COLOR_MASK_ALPHA)
1529 png_set_strip_alpha(png_ptr);
1531 If you strip the alpha channel you need to find some other way of dealing with
1532 the information. If, instead, you want to convert the image to an opaque
1533 version with no alpha channel use png_set_background; see below.
1535 As of libpng version 1.5.2, almost all useful expansions are supported, the
1536 major ommissions are conversion of grayscale to indexed images (which can be
1537 done trivially in the application) and conversion of indexed to grayscale (which
1538 can be done by a trivial manipulation of the palette.)
1540 In the following table, the 01 means grayscale with depth<8, 31 means
1541 indexed with depth<8, other numerals represent the color type, "T" means
1542 the tRNS chunk is present, A means an alpha channel is present, and O
1543 means tRNS or alpha is present but all pixels in the image are opaque.
1545 FROM 01 31 0 0T 0O 2 2T 2O 3 3T 3O 4A 4O 6A 6O
1547 01 - [G] - - - - - - - - - - - - -
1548 31 [Q] Q [Q] [Q] [Q] Q Q Q Q Q Q [Q] [Q] Q Q
1549 0 1 G + . . G G G G G G B B GB GB
1550 0T lt Gt t + . Gt G G Gt G G Bt Bt GBt GBt
1551 0O lt Gt t . + Gt Gt G Gt Gt G Bt Bt GBt GBt
1552 2 C P C C C + . . C - - CB CB B B
1553 2T Ct - Ct C C t + t - - - CBt CBt Bt Bt
1554 2O Ct - Ct C C t t + - - - CBt CBt Bt Bt
1555 3 [Q] p [Q] [Q] [Q] Q Q Q + . . [Q] [Q] Q Q
1556 3T [Qt] p [Qt][Q] [Q] Qt Qt Qt t + t [Qt][Qt] Qt Qt
1557 3O [Qt] p [Qt][Q] [Q] Qt Qt Qt t t + [Qt][Qt] Qt Qt
1558 4A lA G A T T GA GT GT GA GT GT + BA G GBA
1559 4O lA GBA A T T GA GT GT GA GT GT BA + GBA G
1560 6A CA PA CA C C A T tT PA P P C CBA + BA
1561 6O CA PBA CA C C A tT T PA P P CBA C BA +
1564 "+" identifies entries where 'from' and 'to' are the same.
1565 "-" means the transformation is not supported.
1566 "." means nothing is necessary (a tRNS chunk can just be ignored).
1567 "t" means the transformation is obtained by png_set_tRNS.
1568 "A" means the transformation is obtained by png_set_add_alpha().
1569 "X" means the transformation is obtained by png_set_expand().
1570 "1" means the transformation is obtained by
1571 png_set_expand_gray_1_2_4_to_8() (and by png_set_expand() if there
1572 is no transparency in the original or the final format).
1573 "C" means the transformation is obtained by png_set_gray_to_rgb().
1574 "G" means the transformation is obtained by png_set_rgb_to_gray().
1575 "P" means the transformation is obtained by
1576 png_set_expand_palette_to_rgb().
1577 "p" means the transformation is obtained by png_set_packing().
1578 "Q" means the transformation is obtained by png_set_quantize().
1579 "T" means the transformation is obtained by png_set_tRNS_to_alpha().
1580 "B" means the transformation is obtained by png_set_background(), or
1583 When an entry has multiple transforms listed all are required to cause the
1584 right overall transformation. When two transforms are separated by a comma
1585 either will do the job. When transforms are enclosed in [] the transform should
1586 do the job but this is currently unimplemented - a different format will result
1587 if the suggested transformations are used.
1589 In PNG files, the alpha channel in an image
1590 is the level of opacity. If you need the alpha channel in an image to
1591 be the level of transparency instead of opacity, you can invert the
1592 alpha channel (or the tRNS chunk data) after it's read, so that 0 is
1593 fully opaque and 255 (in 8-bit or paletted images) or 65535 (in 16-bit
1594 images) is fully transparent, with
1596 png_set_invert_alpha(png_ptr);
1598 PNG files pack pixels of bit depths 1, 2, and 4 into bytes as small as
1599 they can, resulting in, for example, 8 pixels per byte for 1 bit
1600 files. This code expands to 1 pixel per byte without changing the
1601 values of the pixels:
1604 png_set_packing(png_ptr);
1606 PNG files have possible bit depths of 1, 2, 4, 8, and 16. All pixels
1607 stored in a PNG image have been "scaled" or "shifted" up to the next
1608 higher possible bit depth (e.g. from 5 bits/sample in the range [0,31]
1609 to 8 bits/sample in the range [0, 255]). However, it is also possible
1610 to convert the PNG pixel data back to the original bit depth of the
1611 image. This call reduces the pixels back down to the original bit depth:
1613 png_color_8p sig_bit;
1615 if (png_get_sBIT(png_ptr, info_ptr, &sig_bit))
1616 png_set_shift(png_ptr, sig_bit);
1618 PNG files store 3-color pixels in red, green, blue order. This code
1619 changes the storage of the pixels to blue, green, red:
1621 if (color_type == PNG_COLOR_TYPE_RGB ||
1622 color_type == PNG_COLOR_TYPE_RGB_ALPHA)
1623 png_set_bgr(png_ptr);
1625 PNG files store RGB pixels packed into 3 or 6 bytes. This code expands them
1626 into 4 or 8 bytes for windowing systems that need them in this format:
1628 if (color_type == PNG_COLOR_TYPE_RGB)
1629 png_set_filler(png_ptr, filler, PNG_FILLER_BEFORE);
1631 where "filler" is the 8 or 16-bit number to fill with, and the location is
1632 either PNG_FILLER_BEFORE or PNG_FILLER_AFTER, depending upon whether
1633 you want the filler before the RGB or after. This transformation
1634 does not affect images that already have full alpha channels. To add an
1635 opaque alpha channel, use filler=0xff or 0xffff and PNG_FILLER_AFTER which
1636 will generate RGBA pixels.
1638 Note that png_set_filler() does not change the color type. If you want
1639 to do that, you can add a true alpha channel with
1641 if (color_type == PNG_COLOR_TYPE_RGB ||
1642 color_type == PNG_COLOR_TYPE_GRAY)
1643 png_set_add_alpha(png_ptr, filler, PNG_FILLER_AFTER);
1645 where "filler" contains the alpha value to assign to each pixel.
1646 This function was added in libpng-1.2.7.
1648 If you are reading an image with an alpha channel, and you need the
1649 data as ARGB instead of the normal PNG format RGBA:
1651 if (color_type == PNG_COLOR_TYPE_RGB_ALPHA)
1652 png_set_swap_alpha(png_ptr);
1654 For some uses, you may want a grayscale image to be represented as
1655 RGB. This code will do that conversion:
1657 if (color_type == PNG_COLOR_TYPE_GRAY ||
1658 color_type == PNG_COLOR_TYPE_GRAY_ALPHA)
1659 png_set_gray_to_rgb(png_ptr);
1661 Conversely, you can convert an RGB or RGBA image to grayscale or grayscale
1664 if (color_type == PNG_COLOR_TYPE_RGB ||
1665 color_type == PNG_COLOR_TYPE_RGB_ALPHA)
1666 png_set_rgb_to_gray(png_ptr, error_action, double red_weight,
1667 double green_weight);
1669 error_action = 1: silently do the conversion
1671 error_action = 2: issue a warning if the original
1672 image has any pixel where
1673 red != green or red != blue
1675 error_action = 3: issue an error and abort the
1676 conversion if the original
1677 image has any pixel where
1678 red != green or red != blue
1680 red_weight: weight of red component
1682 green_weight: weight of green component
1683 If either weight is negative, default
1686 In the corresponding fixed point API the red_weight and green_weight values are
1687 simply scaled by 100,000:
1689 png_set_rgb_to_gray(png_ptr, error_action, png_fixed_point red_weight,
1690 png_fixed_point green_weight);
1692 If you have set error_action = 1 or 2, you can
1693 later check whether the image really was gray, after processing
1694 the image rows, with the png_get_rgb_to_gray_status(png_ptr) function.
1695 It will return a png_byte that is zero if the image was gray or
1696 1 if there were any non-gray pixels. Background and sBIT data
1697 will be silently converted to grayscale, using the green channel
1698 data for sBIT, regardless of the error_action setting.
1700 The default values come from the PNG file cHRM chunk if present; otherwise, the
1701 defaults correspond to the ITU-R recommendation 709, and also the sRGB color
1702 space, as recommended in the Charles Poynton's Colour FAQ,
1703 <http://www.poynton.com/>, in section 9:
1705 <http://www.poynton.com/notes/colour_and_gamma/ColorFAQ.html#RTFToC9>
1707 Y = 0.2126 * R + 0.7152 * G + 0.0722 * B
1709 Previous versions of this document, 1998 through 2002, recommended a slightly
1712 Y = 0.212671 * R + 0.715160 * G + 0.072169 * B
1714 Libpng uses an integer approximation:
1716 Y = (6968 * R + 23434 * G + 2366 * B)/32768
1718 The calculation is done in a linear colorspace, if the image gamma
1721 The png_set_background() function has been described already; it tells libpng to
1722 composite images with alpha or simple transparency against the supplied
1723 background color. For compatibility with versions of libpng earlier than
1724 libpng-1.5.4 it is recommended that you call the function after reading the file
1725 header, even if you don't want to use the color in a bKGD chunk, if one exists.
1727 If the PNG file contains a bKGD chunk (PNG_INFO_bKGD valid),
1728 you may use this color, or supply another color more suitable for
1729 the current display (e.g., the background color from a web page). You
1730 need to tell libpng how the color is represented, both the format of the
1731 component values in the color (the number of bits) and the gamma encoding of the
1732 color. The function takes two arguments, background_gamma_mode and need_expand
1733 to convey this information, however only two combinations are likely to be
1736 png_color_16 my_background;
1737 png_color_16p image_background;
1739 if (png_get_bKGD(png_ptr, info_ptr, &image_background))
1740 png_set_background(png_ptr, image_background,
1741 PNG_BACKGROUND_GAMMA_FILE, 1/*needs to be expanded*/, 1);
1743 png_set_background(png_ptr, &my_background,
1744 PNG_BACKGROUND_GAMMA_SCREEN, 0/*do not expand*/, 1);
1746 The second call was described above - my_background is in the format of the
1747 final, display, output produced by libpng. Because you now know the format of
1748 the PNG it is possible to avoid the need to choose either 8-bit or 16-bit
1749 output and to retain palette images (the palette colors will be modified
1750 appropriately and the tRNS chunk removed.) However, if you are doing this,
1751 take great care not to ask for transformations without checking first that
1754 In the first call the background color has the original bit depth and color type
1755 of the PNG file. So, for palette images the color is supplied as a palette
1756 index and for low bit greyscale images the color is a reduced bit value in
1757 image_background->gray.
1759 If you didn't call png_set_gamma() before reading the file header, for example
1760 if you need your code to remain compatible with older versions of libpng prior
1761 to libpng-1.5.4, this is the place to call it.
1763 Do not call it if you called png_set_alpha_mode(); doing so will damage the
1764 settings put in place by png_set_alpha_mode(). (If png_set_alpha_mode() is
1765 supported then you can certainly do png_set_gamma() before reading the PNG
1768 This API unconditionally sets the screen and file gamma values, so it will
1769 override the value in the PNG file unless it is called before the PNG file
1770 reading starts. For this reason you must always call it with the PNG file
1771 value when you call it in this position:
1773 if (png_get_gAMA(png_ptr, info_ptr, &file_gamma))
1774 png_set_gamma(png_ptr, screen_gamma, file_gamma);
1777 png_set_gamma(png_ptr, screen_gamma, 0.45455);
1779 If you need to reduce an RGB file to a paletted file, or if a paletted
1780 file has more entries then will fit on your screen, png_set_quantize()
1781 will do that. Note that this is a simple match quantization that merely
1782 finds the closest color available. This should work fairly well with
1783 optimized palettes, but fairly badly with linear color cubes. If you
1784 pass a palette that is larger than maximum_colors, the file will
1785 reduce the number of colors in the palette so it will fit into
1786 maximum_colors. If there is a histogram, libpng will use it to make
1787 more intelligent choices when reducing the palette. If there is no
1788 histogram, it may not do as good a job.
1790 if (color_type & PNG_COLOR_MASK_COLOR)
1792 if (png_get_valid(png_ptr, info_ptr,
1795 png_uint_16p histogram = NULL;
1797 png_get_hIST(png_ptr, info_ptr,
1799 png_set_quantize(png_ptr, palette, num_palette,
1800 max_screen_colors, histogram, 1);
1805 png_color std_color_cube[MAX_SCREEN_COLORS] =
1808 png_set_quantize(png_ptr, std_color_cube,
1809 MAX_SCREEN_COLORS, MAX_SCREEN_COLORS,
1814 PNG files describe monochrome as black being zero and white being one.
1815 The following code will reverse this (make black be one and white be
1818 if (bit_depth == 1 && color_type == PNG_COLOR_TYPE_GRAY)
1819 png_set_invert_mono(png_ptr);
1821 This function can also be used to invert grayscale and gray-alpha images:
1823 if (color_type == PNG_COLOR_TYPE_GRAY ||
1824 color_type == PNG_COLOR_TYPE_GRAY_ALPHA)
1825 png_set_invert_mono(png_ptr);
1827 PNG files store 16-bit pixels in network byte order (big-endian,
1828 ie. most significant bits first). This code changes the storage to the
1829 other way (little-endian, i.e. least significant bits first, the
1830 way PCs store them):
1832 if (bit_depth == 16)
1833 png_set_swap(png_ptr);
1835 If you are using packed-pixel images (1, 2, or 4 bits/pixel), and you
1836 need to change the order the pixels are packed into bytes, you can use:
1839 png_set_packswap(png_ptr);
1841 Finally, you can write your own transformation function if none of
1842 the existing ones meets your needs. This is done by setting a callback
1845 png_set_read_user_transform_fn(png_ptr,
1848 You must supply the function
1850 void read_transform_fn(png_structp png_ptr, png_row_infop
1851 row_info, png_bytep data)
1853 See pngtest.c for a working example. Your function will be called
1854 after all of the other transformations have been processed. Take care with
1855 interlaced images if you do the interlace yourself - the width of the row is the
1856 width in 'row_info', not the overall image width.
1858 If supported, libpng provides two information routines that you can use to find
1859 where you are in processing the image:
1861 png_get_current_pass_number(png_structp png_ptr);
1862 png_get_current_row_number(png_structp png_ptr);
1864 Don't try using these outside a transform callback - firstly they are only
1865 supported if user transforms are supported, secondly they may well return
1866 unexpected results unless the row is actually being processed at the moment they
1870 images the value returned is the row in the input sub-image image. Use
1871 PNG_ROW_FROM_PASS_ROW(row, pass) and PNG_COL_FROM_PASS_COL(col, pass) to
1872 find the output pixel (x,y) given an interlaced sub-image pixel (row,col,pass).
1874 The discussion of interlace handling above contains more information on how to
1877 You can also set up a pointer to a user structure for use by your
1878 callback function, and you can inform libpng that your transform
1879 function will change the number of channels or bit depth with the
1882 png_set_user_transform_info(png_ptr, user_ptr,
1883 user_depth, user_channels);
1885 The user's application, not libpng, is responsible for allocating and
1886 freeing any memory required for the user structure.
1888 You can retrieve the pointer via the function
1889 png_get_user_transform_ptr(). For example:
1891 voidp read_user_transform_ptr =
1892 png_get_user_transform_ptr(png_ptr);
1894 The last thing to handle is interlacing; this is covered in detail below,
1895 but you must call the function here if you want libpng to handle expansion
1896 of the interlaced image.
1898 number_of_passes = png_set_interlace_handling(png_ptr);
1900 After setting the transformations, libpng can update your png_info
1901 structure to reflect any transformations you've requested with this
1904 png_read_update_info(png_ptr, info_ptr);
1906 This is most useful to update the info structure's rowbytes
1907 field so you can use it to allocate your image memory. This function
1908 will also update your palette with the correct screen_gamma and
1909 background if these have been given with the calls above. You may
1910 only call png_read_update_info() once with a particular info_ptr.
1912 After you call png_read_update_info(), you can allocate any
1913 memory you need to hold the image. The row data is simply
1914 raw byte data for all forms of images. As the actual allocation
1915 varies among applications, no example will be given. If you
1916 are allocating one large chunk, you will need to build an
1917 array of pointers to each row, as it will be needed for some
1918 of the functions below.
1920 Remember: Before you call png_read_update_info(), the png_get_*()
1921 functions return the values corresponding to the original PNG image.
1922 After you call png_read_update_info the values refer to the image
1923 that libpng will output. Consequently you must call all the png_set_
1924 functions before you call png_read_update_info(). This is particularly
1925 important for png_set_interlace_handling() - if you are going to call
1926 png_read_update_info() you must call png_set_interlace_handling() before
1927 it unless you want to receive interlaced output.
1931 After you've allocated memory, you can read the image data.
1932 The simplest way to do this is in one function call. If you are
1933 allocating enough memory to hold the whole image, you can just
1934 call png_read_image() and libpng will read in all the image data
1935 and put it in the memory area supplied. You will need to pass in
1936 an array of pointers to each row.
1938 This function automatically handles interlacing, so you don't
1939 need to call png_set_interlace_handling() (unless you call
1940 png_read_update_info()) or call this function multiple times, or any
1941 of that other stuff necessary with png_read_rows().
1943 png_read_image(png_ptr, row_pointers);
1945 where row_pointers is:
1947 png_bytep row_pointers[height];
1949 You can point to void or char or whatever you use for pixels.
1951 If you don't want to read in the whole image at once, you can
1952 use png_read_rows() instead. If there is no interlacing (check
1953 interlace_type == PNG_INTERLACE_NONE), this is simple:
1955 png_read_rows(png_ptr, row_pointers, NULL,
1958 where row_pointers is the same as in the png_read_image() call.
1960 If you are doing this just one row at a time, you can do this with
1961 a single row_pointer instead of an array of row_pointers:
1963 png_bytep row_pointer = row;
1964 png_read_row(png_ptr, row_pointer, NULL);
1966 If the file is interlaced (interlace_type != 0 in the IHDR chunk), things
1967 get somewhat harder. The only current (PNG Specification version 1.2)
1968 interlacing type for PNG is (interlace_type == PNG_INTERLACE_ADAM7);
1969 a somewhat complicated 2D interlace scheme, known as Adam7, that
1970 breaks down an image into seven smaller images of varying size, based
1971 on an 8x8 grid. This number is defined (from libpng 1.5) as
1972 PNG_INTERLACE_ADAM7_PASSES in png.h
1974 libpng can fill out those images or it can give them to you "as is".
1975 It is almost always better to have libpng handle the interlacing for you.
1976 If you want the images filled out, there are two ways to do that. The one
1977 mentioned in the PNG specification is to expand each pixel to cover
1978 those pixels that have not been read yet (the "rectangle" method).
1979 This results in a blocky image for the first pass, which gradually
1980 smooths out as more pixels are read. The other method is the "sparkle"
1981 method, where pixels are drawn only in their final locations, with the
1982 rest of the image remaining whatever colors they were initialized to
1983 before the start of the read. The first method usually looks better,
1984 but tends to be slower, as there are more pixels to put in the rows.
1986 If, as is likely, you want libpng to expand the images, call this before
1987 calling png_start_read_image() or png_read_update_info():
1989 if (interlace_type == PNG_INTERLACE_ADAM7)
1991 = png_set_interlace_handling(png_ptr);
1993 This will return the number of passes needed. Currently, this is seven,
1994 but may change if another interlace type is added. This function can be
1995 called even if the file is not interlaced, where it will return one pass.
1996 You then need to read the whole image 'number_of_passes' times. Each time
1997 will distribute the pixels from the current pass to the correct place in
1998 the output image, so you need to supply the same rows to png_read_rows in
2001 If you are not going to display the image after each pass, but are
2002 going to wait until the entire image is read in, use the sparkle
2003 effect. This effect is faster and the end result of either method
2004 is exactly the same. If you are planning on displaying the image
2005 after each pass, the "rectangle" effect is generally considered the
2008 If you only want the "sparkle" effect, just call png_read_rows() as
2009 normal, with the third parameter NULL. Make sure you make pass over
2010 the image number_of_passes times, and you don't change the data in the
2011 rows between calls. You can change the locations of the data, just
2012 not the data. Each pass only writes the pixels appropriate for that
2013 pass, and assumes the data from previous passes is still valid.
2015 png_read_rows(png_ptr, row_pointers, NULL,
2018 If you only want the first effect (the rectangles), do the same as
2019 before except pass the row buffer in the third parameter, and leave
2020 the second parameter NULL.
2022 png_read_rows(png_ptr, NULL, row_pointers,
2025 If you don't want libpng to handle the interlacing details, just call
2026 png_read_rows() PNG_INTERLACE_ADAM7_PASSES times to read in all the images.
2027 Each of the images is a valid image by itself, however you will almost
2028 certainly need to distribute the pixels from each sub-image to the
2029 correct place. This is where everything gets very tricky.
2031 If you want to retrieve the separate images you must pass the correct
2032 number of rows to each successive call of png_read_rows(). The calculation
2033 gets pretty complicated for small images, where some sub-images may
2034 not even exist because either their width or height ends up zero.
2035 libpng provides two macros to help you in 1.5 and later versions:
2037 png_uint_32 width = PNG_PASS_COLS(image_width, pass_number);
2038 png_uint_32 height = PNG_PASS_ROWS(image_height, pass_number);
2040 Respectively these tell you the width and height of the sub-image
2041 corresponding to the numbered pass. 'pass' is in in the range 0 to 6 -
2042 this can be confusing because the specification refers to the same passes
2043 as 1 to 7! Be careful, you must check both the width and height before
2044 calling png_read_rows() and not call it for that pass if either is zero.
2046 You can, of course, read each sub-image row by row. If you want to
2047 produce optimal code to make a pixel-by-pixel transformation of an
2048 interlaced image this is the best approach; read each row of each pass,
2049 transform it, and write it out to a new interlaced image.
2051 If you want to de-interlace the image yourself libpng provides further
2052 macros to help that tell you where to place the pixels in the output image.
2053 Because the interlacing scheme is rectangular - sub-image pixels are always
2054 arranged on a rectangular grid - all you need to know for each pass is the
2055 starting column and row in the output image of the first pixel plus the
2056 spacing between each pixel. As of libpng 1.5 there are four macros to
2057 retrieve this information:
2059 png_uint_32 x = PNG_PASS_START_COL(pass);
2060 png_uint_32 y = PNG_PASS_START_ROW(pass);
2061 png_uint_32 xStep = 1U << PNG_PASS_COL_SHIFT(pass);
2062 png_uint_32 yStep = 1U << PNG_PASS_ROW_SHIFT(pass);
2064 These allow you to write the obvious loop:
2066 png_uint_32 input_y = 0;
2067 png_uint_32 output_y = PNG_PASS_START_ROW(pass);
2069 while (output_y < output_image_height)
2071 png_uint_32 input_x = 0;
2072 png_uint_32 output_x = PNG_PASS_START_COL(pass);
2074 while (output_x < output_image_width)
2076 image[output_y][output_x] =
2077 subimage[pass][input_y][input_x++];
2086 Notice that the steps between successive output rows and columns are
2087 returned as shifts. This is possible because the pixels in the subimages
2088 are always a power of 2 apart - 1, 2, 4 or 8 pixels - in the original
2089 image. In practice you may need to directly calculate the output coordinate
2090 given an input coordinate. libpng provides two further macros for this
2093 png_uint_32 output_x = PNG_COL_FROM_PASS_COL(input_x, pass);
2094 png_uint_32 output_y = PNG_ROW_FROM_PASS_ROW(input_y, pass);
2096 Finally a pair of macros are provided to tell you if a particular image
2097 row or column appears in a given pass:
2099 int col_in_pass = PNG_COL_IN_INTERLACE_PASS(output_x, pass);
2100 int row_in_pass = PNG_ROW_IN_INTERLACE_PASS(output_y, pass);
2102 Bear in mind that you will probably also need to check the width and height
2103 of the pass in addition to the above to be sure the pass even exists!
2105 With any luck you are convinced by now that you don't want to do your own
2106 interlace handling. In reality normally the only good reason for doing this
2107 is if you are processing PNG files on a pixel-by-pixel basis and don't want
2108 to load the whole file into memory when it is interlaced.
2110 libpng includes a test program, pngvalid, that illustrates reading and
2111 writing of interlaced images. If you can't get interlacing to work in your
2112 code and don't want to leave it to libpng (the recommended approach), see
2113 how pngvalid.c does it.
2115 Finishing a sequential read
2117 After you are finished reading the image through the
2118 low-level interface, you can finish reading the file. If you are
2119 interested in comments or time, which may be stored either before or
2120 after the image data, you should pass the separate png_info struct if
2121 you want to keep the comments from before and after the image
2124 png_infop end_info = png_create_info_struct(png_ptr);
2128 png_destroy_read_struct(&png_ptr, &info_ptr,
2133 png_read_end(png_ptr, end_info);
2135 If you are not interested, you should still call png_read_end()
2136 but you can pass NULL, avoiding the need to create an end_info structure.
2138 png_read_end(png_ptr, (png_infop)NULL);
2140 If you don't call png_read_end(), then your file pointer will be
2141 left pointing to the first chunk after the last IDAT, which is probably
2142 not what you want if you expect to read something beyond the end of
2145 When you are done, you can free all memory allocated by libpng like this:
2147 png_destroy_read_struct(&png_ptr, &info_ptr,
2150 or, if you didn't create an end_info structure,
2152 png_destroy_read_struct(&png_ptr, &info_ptr,
2155 It is also possible to individually free the info_ptr members that
2156 point to libpng-allocated storage with the following function:
2158 png_free_data(png_ptr, info_ptr, mask, seq)
2160 mask - identifies data to be freed, a mask
2161 containing the bitwise OR of one or
2163 PNG_FREE_PLTE, PNG_FREE_TRNS,
2164 PNG_FREE_HIST, PNG_FREE_ICCP,
2165 PNG_FREE_PCAL, PNG_FREE_ROWS,
2166 PNG_FREE_SCAL, PNG_FREE_SPLT,
2167 PNG_FREE_TEXT, PNG_FREE_UNKN,
2168 or simply PNG_FREE_ALL
2170 seq - sequence number of item to be freed
2173 This function may be safely called when the relevant storage has
2174 already been freed, or has not yet been allocated, or was allocated
2175 by the user and not by libpng, and will in those cases do nothing.
2176 The "seq" parameter is ignored if only one item of the selected data
2177 type, such as PLTE, is allowed. If "seq" is not -1, and multiple items
2178 are allowed for the data type identified in the mask, such as text or
2179 sPLT, only the n'th item in the structure is freed, where n is "seq".
2181 The default behavior is only to free data that was allocated internally
2182 by libpng. This can be changed, so that libpng will not free the data,
2183 or so that it will free data that was allocated by the user with png_malloc()
2184 or png_zalloc() and passed in via a png_set_*() function, with
2186 png_data_freer(png_ptr, info_ptr, freer, mask)
2189 PNG_DESTROY_WILL_FREE_DATA
2190 PNG_SET_WILL_FREE_DATA
2191 PNG_USER_WILL_FREE_DATA
2193 mask - which data elements are affected
2194 same choices as in png_free_data()
2196 This function only affects data that has already been allocated.
2197 You can call this function after reading the PNG data but before calling
2198 any png_set_*() functions, to control whether the user or the png_set_*()
2199 function is responsible for freeing any existing data that might be present,
2200 and again after the png_set_*() functions to control whether the user
2201 or png_destroy_*() is supposed to free the data. When the user assumes
2202 responsibility for libpng-allocated data, the application must use
2203 png_free() to free it, and when the user transfers responsibility to libpng
2204 for data that the user has allocated, the user must have used png_malloc()
2205 or png_zalloc() to allocate it.
2207 If you allocated your row_pointers in a single block, as suggested above in
2208 the description of the high level read interface, you must not transfer
2209 responsibility for freeing it to the png_set_rows or png_read_destroy function,
2210 because they would also try to free the individual row_pointers[i].
2212 If you allocated text_ptr.text, text_ptr.lang, and text_ptr.translated_keyword
2213 separately, do not transfer responsibility for freeing text_ptr to libpng,
2214 because when libpng fills a png_text structure it combines these members with
2215 the key member, and png_free_data() will free only text_ptr.key. Similarly,
2216 if you transfer responsibility for free'ing text_ptr from libpng to your
2217 application, your application must not separately free those members.
2219 The png_free_data() function will turn off the "valid" flag for anything
2220 it frees. If you need to turn the flag off for a chunk that was freed by
2221 your application instead of by libpng, you can use
2223 png_set_invalid(png_ptr, info_ptr, mask);
2225 mask - identifies the chunks to be made invalid,
2226 containing the bitwise OR of one or
2228 PNG_INFO_gAMA, PNG_INFO_sBIT,
2229 PNG_INFO_cHRM, PNG_INFO_PLTE,
2230 PNG_INFO_tRNS, PNG_INFO_bKGD,
2231 PNG_INFO_hIST, PNG_INFO_pHYs,
2232 PNG_INFO_oFFs, PNG_INFO_tIME,
2233 PNG_INFO_pCAL, PNG_INFO_sRGB,
2234 PNG_INFO_iCCP, PNG_INFO_sPLT,
2235 PNG_INFO_sCAL, PNG_INFO_IDAT
2237 For a more compact example of reading a PNG image, see the file example.c.
2239 Reading PNG files progressively
2241 The progressive reader is slightly different then the non-progressive
2242 reader. Instead of calling png_read_info(), png_read_rows(), and
2243 png_read_end(), you make one call to png_process_data(), which calls
2244 callbacks when it has the info, a row, or the end of the image. You
2245 set up these callbacks with png_set_progressive_read_fn(). You don't
2246 have to worry about the input/output functions of libpng, as you are
2247 giving the library the data directly in png_process_data(). I will
2248 assume that you have read the section on reading PNG files above,
2249 so I will only highlight the differences (although I will show
2252 png_structp png_ptr;
2255 /* An example code fragment of how you would
2256 initialize the progressive reader in your
2259 initialize_png_reader()
2261 png_ptr = png_create_read_struct
2262 (PNG_LIBPNG_VER_STRING, (png_voidp)user_error_ptr,
2263 user_error_fn, user_warning_fn);
2268 info_ptr = png_create_info_struct(png_ptr);
2272 png_destroy_read_struct(&png_ptr,
2273 (png_infopp)NULL, (png_infopp)NULL);
2277 if (setjmp(png_jmpbuf(png_ptr)))
2279 png_destroy_read_struct(&png_ptr, &info_ptr,
2284 /* This one's new. You can provide functions
2285 to be called when the header info is valid,
2286 when each row is completed, and when the image
2287 is finished. If you aren't using all functions,
2288 you can specify NULL parameters. Even when all
2289 three functions are NULL, you need to call
2290 png_set_progressive_read_fn(). You can use
2291 any struct as the user_ptr (cast to a void pointer
2292 for the function call), and retrieve the pointer
2293 from inside the callbacks using the function
2295 png_get_progressive_ptr(png_ptr);
2297 which will return a void pointer, which you have
2298 to cast appropriately.
2300 png_set_progressive_read_fn(png_ptr, (void *)user_ptr,
2301 info_callback, row_callback, end_callback);
2306 /* A code fragment that you call as you receive blocks
2309 process_data(png_bytep buffer, png_uint_32 length)
2311 if (setjmp(png_jmpbuf(png_ptr)))
2313 png_destroy_read_struct(&png_ptr, &info_ptr,
2318 /* This one's new also. Simply give it a chunk
2319 of data from the file stream (in order, of
2320 course). On machines with segmented memory
2321 models machines, don't give it any more than
2322 64K. The library seems to run fine with sizes
2323 of 4K. Although you can give it much less if
2324 necessary (I assume you can give it chunks of
2325 1 byte, I haven't tried less then 256 bytes
2326 yet). When this function returns, you may
2327 want to display any rows that were generated
2328 in the row callback if you don't already do
2331 png_process_data(png_ptr, info_ptr, buffer, length);
2333 /* At this point you can call png_process_data_skip if
2334 you want to handle data the library will skip yourself;
2335 it simply returns the number of bytes to skip (and stops
2336 libpng skipping that number of bytes on the next
2337 png_process_data call).
2341 /* This function is called (as set by
2342 png_set_progressive_read_fn() above) when enough data
2343 has been supplied so all of the header has been
2347 info_callback(png_structp png_ptr, png_infop info)
2349 /* Do any setup here, including setting any of
2350 the transformations mentioned in the Reading
2351 PNG files section. For now, you _must_ call
2352 either png_start_read_image() or
2353 png_read_update_info() after all the
2354 transformations are set (even if you don't set
2355 any). You may start getting rows before
2356 png_process_data() returns, so this is your
2357 last chance to prepare for that.
2359 This is where you turn on interlace handling,
2360 assuming you don't want to do it yourself.
2362 If you need to you can stop the processing of
2363 your original input data at this point by calling
2364 png_process_data_pause. This returns the number
2365 of unprocessed bytes from the last png_process_data
2366 call - it is up to you to ensure that the next call
2367 sees these bytes again. If you don't want to bother
2368 with this you can get libpng to cache the unread
2369 bytes by setting the 'save' parameter (see png.h) but
2370 then libpng will have to copy the data internally.
2374 /* This function is called when each row of image
2377 row_callback(png_structp png_ptr, png_bytep new_row,
2378 png_uint_32 row_num, int pass)
2380 /* If the image is interlaced, and you turned
2381 on the interlace handler, this function will
2382 be called for every row in every pass. Some
2383 of these rows will not be changed from the
2384 previous pass. When the row is not changed,
2385 the new_row variable will be NULL. The rows
2386 and passes are called in order, so you don't
2387 really need the row_num and pass, but I'm
2388 supplying them because it may make your life
2391 If you did not turn on interlace handling then
2392 the callback is called for each row of each
2393 sub-image when the image is interlaced. In this
2394 case 'row_num' is the row in the sub-image, not
2395 the row in the output image as it is in all other
2398 For the non-NULL rows of interlaced images when
2399 you have switched on libpng interlace handling,
2400 you must call png_progressive_combine_row()
2401 passing in the row and the old row. You can
2402 call this function for NULL rows (it will just
2403 return) and for non-interlaced images (it just
2404 does the memcpy for you) if it will make the
2405 code easier. Thus, you can just do this for
2406 all cases if you switch on interlace handling;
2409 png_progressive_combine_row(png_ptr, old_row,
2412 /* where old_row is what was displayed for
2413 previously for the row. Note that the first
2414 pass (pass == 0, really) will completely cover
2415 the old row, so the rows do not have to be
2416 initialized. After the first pass (and only
2417 for interlaced images), you will have to pass
2418 the current row, and the function will combine
2419 the old row and the new row.
2421 You can also call png_process_data_pause in this
2422 callback - see above.
2427 end_callback(png_structp png_ptr, png_infop info)
2429 /* This function is called after the whole image
2430 has been read, including any chunks after the
2431 image (up to and including the IEND). You
2432 will usually have the same info chunk as you
2433 had in the header, although some data may have
2434 been added to the comments and time fields.
2436 Most people won't do much here, perhaps setting
2437 a flag that marks the image as finished.
2445 Much of this is very similar to reading. However, everything of
2446 importance is repeated here, so you won't have to constantly look
2447 back up in the reading section to understand writing.
2451 You will want to do the I/O initialization before you get into libpng,
2452 so if it doesn't work, you don't have anything to undo. If you are not
2453 using the standard I/O functions, you will need to replace them with
2454 custom writing functions. See the discussion under Customizing libpng.
2456 FILE *fp = fopen(file_name, "wb");
2461 Next, png_struct and png_info need to be allocated and initialized.
2462 As these can be both relatively large, you may not want to store these
2463 on the stack, unless you have stack space to spare. Of course, you
2464 will want to check if they return NULL. If you are also reading,
2465 you won't want to name your read structure and your write structure
2466 both "png_ptr"; you can call them anything you like, such as
2467 "read_ptr" and "write_ptr". Look at pngtest.c, for example.
2469 png_structp png_ptr = png_create_write_struct
2470 (PNG_LIBPNG_VER_STRING, (png_voidp)user_error_ptr,
2471 user_error_fn, user_warning_fn);
2476 png_infop info_ptr = png_create_info_struct(png_ptr);
2479 png_destroy_write_struct(&png_ptr,
2484 If you want to use your own memory allocation routines,
2485 define PNG_USER_MEM_SUPPORTED and use
2486 png_create_write_struct_2() instead of png_create_write_struct():
2488 png_structp png_ptr = png_create_write_struct_2
2489 (PNG_LIBPNG_VER_STRING, (png_voidp)user_error_ptr,
2490 user_error_fn, user_warning_fn, (png_voidp)
2491 user_mem_ptr, user_malloc_fn, user_free_fn);
2493 After you have these structures, you will need to set up the
2494 error handling. When libpng encounters an error, it expects to
2495 longjmp() back to your routine. Therefore, you will need to call
2496 setjmp() and pass the png_jmpbuf(png_ptr). If you
2497 write the file from different routines, you will need to update
2498 the png_jmpbuf(png_ptr) every time you enter a new routine that will
2499 call a png_*() function. See your documentation of setjmp/longjmp
2500 for your compiler for more information on setjmp/longjmp. See
2501 the discussion on libpng error handling in the Customizing Libpng
2502 section below for more information on the libpng error handling.
2504 if (setjmp(png_jmpbuf(png_ptr)))
2506 png_destroy_write_struct(&png_ptr, &info_ptr);
2513 If you would rather avoid the complexity of setjmp/longjmp issues,
2514 you can compile libpng with PNG_NO_SETJMP, in which case
2515 errors will result in a call to PNG_ABORT() which defaults to abort().
2517 You can #define PNG_ABORT() to a function that does something
2518 more useful than abort(), as long as your function does not
2521 Now you need to set up the output code. The default for libpng is to
2522 use the C function fwrite(). If you use this, you will need to pass a
2523 valid FILE * in the function png_init_io(). Be sure that the file is
2524 opened in binary mode. Again, if you wish to handle writing data in
2525 another way, see the discussion on libpng I/O handling in the Customizing
2526 Libpng section below.
2528 png_init_io(png_ptr, fp);
2530 If you are embedding your PNG into a datastream such as MNG, and don't
2531 want libpng to write the 8-byte signature, or if you have already
2532 written the signature in your application, use
2534 png_set_sig_bytes(png_ptr, 8);
2536 to inform libpng that it should not write a signature.
2540 At this point, you can set up a callback function that will be
2541 called after each row has been written, which you can use to control
2542 a progress meter or the like. It's demonstrated in pngtest.c.
2543 You must supply a function
2545 void write_row_callback(png_structp png_ptr, png_uint_32 row,
2548 /* put your code here */
2551 (You can give it another name that you like instead of "write_row_callback")
2553 To inform libpng about your function, use
2555 png_set_write_status_fn(png_ptr, write_row_callback);
2557 When this function is called the row has already been completely processed and
2558 it has also been written out. The 'row' and 'pass' refer to the next row to be
2560 non-interlaced case the row that was just handled is simply one less than the
2561 passed in row number, and pass will always be 0. For the interlaced case the
2562 same applies unless the row value is 0, in which case the row just handled was
2563 the last one from one of the preceding passes. Because interlacing may skip a
2564 pass you cannot be sure that the preceding pass is just 'pass-1', if you really
2565 need to know what the last pass is record (row,pass) from the callback and use
2566 the last recorded value each time.
2568 As with the user transform you can find the output row using the
2569 PNG_ROW_FROM_PASS_ROW macro.
2571 You now have the option of modifying how the compression library will
2572 run. The following functions are mainly for testing, but may be useful
2573 in some cases, like if you need to write PNG files extremely fast and
2574 are willing to give up some compression, or if you want to get the
2575 maximum possible compression at the expense of slower writing. If you
2576 have no special needs in this area, let the library do what it wants by
2577 not calling this function at all, as it has been tuned to deliver a good
2578 speed/compression ratio. The second parameter to png_set_filter() is
2579 the filter method, for which the only valid values are 0 (as of the
2580 July 1999 PNG specification, version 1.2) or 64 (if you are writing
2581 a PNG datastream that is to be embedded in a MNG datastream). The third
2582 parameter is a flag that indicates which filter type(s) are to be tested
2583 for each scanline. See the PNG specification for details on the specific
2587 /* turn on or off filtering, and/or choose
2588 specific filters. You can use either a single
2589 PNG_FILTER_VALUE_NAME or the bitwise OR of one
2590 or more PNG_FILTER_NAME masks.
2592 png_set_filter(png_ptr, 0,
2593 PNG_FILTER_NONE | PNG_FILTER_VALUE_NONE |
2594 PNG_FILTER_SUB | PNG_FILTER_VALUE_SUB |
2595 PNG_FILTER_UP | PNG_FILTER_VALUE_UP |
2596 PNG_FILTER_AVG | PNG_FILTER_VALUE_AVG |
2597 PNG_FILTER_PAETH | PNG_FILTER_VALUE_PAETH|
2600 If an application wants to start and stop using particular filters during
2601 compression, it should start out with all of the filters (to ensure that
2602 the previous row of pixels will be stored in case it's needed later),
2603 and then add and remove them after the start of compression.
2605 If you are writing a PNG datastream that is to be embedded in a MNG
2606 datastream, the second parameter can be either 0 or 64.
2608 The png_set_compression_*() functions interface to the zlib compression
2609 library, and should mostly be ignored unless you really know what you are
2610 doing. The only generally useful call is png_set_compression_level()
2611 which changes how much time zlib spends on trying to compress the image
2612 data. See the Compression Library (zlib.h and algorithm.txt, distributed
2613 with zlib) for details on the compression levels.
2617 /* Set the zlib compression level */
2618 png_set_compression_level(png_ptr,
2619 Z_BEST_COMPRESSION);
2621 /* Set other zlib parameters for compressing IDAT */
2622 png_set_compression_mem_level(png_ptr, 8);
2623 png_set_compression_strategy(png_ptr,
2624 Z_DEFAULT_STRATEGY);
2625 png_set_compression_window_bits(png_ptr, 15);
2626 png_set_compression_method(png_ptr, 8);
2627 png_set_compression_buffer_size(png_ptr, 8192)
2629 /* Set zlib parameters for text compression
2630 * If you don't call these, the parameters
2631 * fall back on those defined for IDAT chunks
2633 png_set_text_compression_mem_level(png_ptr, 8);
2634 png_set_text_compression_strategy(png_ptr,
2635 Z_DEFAULT_STRATEGY);
2636 png_set_text_compression_window_bits(png_ptr, 15);
2637 png_set_text_compression_method(png_ptr, 8);
2639 Setting the contents of info for output
2641 You now need to fill in the png_info structure with all the data you
2642 wish to write before the actual image. Note that the only thing you
2643 are allowed to write after the image is the text chunks and the time
2644 chunk (as of PNG Specification 1.2, anyway). See png_write_end() and
2645 the latest PNG specification for more information on that. If you
2646 wish to write them before the image, fill them in now, and flag that
2647 data as being valid. If you want to wait until after the data, don't
2648 fill them until png_write_end(). For all the fields in png_info and
2649 their data types, see png.h. For explanations of what the fields
2650 contain, see the PNG specification.
2652 Some of the more important parts of the png_info are:
2654 png_set_IHDR(png_ptr, info_ptr, width, height,
2655 bit_depth, color_type, interlace_type,
2656 compression_type, filter_method)
2658 width - holds the width of the image
2659 in pixels (up to 2^31).
2661 height - holds the height of the image
2662 in pixels (up to 2^31).
2664 bit_depth - holds the bit depth of one of the
2666 (valid values are 1, 2, 4, 8, 16
2667 and depend also on the
2668 color_type. See also significant
2671 color_type - describes which color/alpha
2672 channels are present.
2674 (bit depths 1, 2, 4, 8, 16)
2675 PNG_COLOR_TYPE_GRAY_ALPHA
2677 PNG_COLOR_TYPE_PALETTE
2678 (bit depths 1, 2, 4, 8)
2681 PNG_COLOR_TYPE_RGB_ALPHA
2684 PNG_COLOR_MASK_PALETTE
2685 PNG_COLOR_MASK_COLOR
2686 PNG_COLOR_MASK_ALPHA
2688 interlace_type - PNG_INTERLACE_NONE or
2691 compression_type - (must be
2692 PNG_COMPRESSION_TYPE_DEFAULT)
2694 filter_method - (must be PNG_FILTER_TYPE_DEFAULT
2695 or, if you are writing a PNG to
2696 be embedded in a MNG datastream,
2698 PNG_INTRAPIXEL_DIFFERENCING)
2700 If you call png_set_IHDR(), the call must appear before any of the
2701 other png_set_*() functions, because they might require access to some of
2702 the IHDR settings. The remaining png_set_*() functions can be called
2705 If you wish, you can reset the compression_type, interlace_type, or
2706 filter_method later by calling png_set_IHDR() again; if you do this, the
2707 width, height, bit_depth, and color_type must be the same in each call.
2709 png_set_PLTE(png_ptr, info_ptr, palette,
2712 palette - the palette for the file
2713 (array of png_color)
2714 num_palette - number of entries in the palette
2716 png_set_gAMA(png_ptr, info_ptr, file_gamma);
2717 png_set_gAMA_fixed(png_ptr, info_ptr, int_file_gamma);
2719 file_gamma - the gamma at which the image was
2720 created (PNG_INFO_gAMA)
2722 int_file_gamma - 100,000 times the gamma at which
2723 the image was created
2725 png_set_cHRM(png_ptr, info_ptr, white_x, white_y, red_x, red_y,
2726 green_x, green_y, blue_x, blue_y)
2727 png_set_cHRM_XYZ(png_ptr, info_ptr, red_X, red_Y, red_Z, green_X,
2728 green_Y, green_Z, blue_X, blue_Y, blue_Z)
2729 png_set_cHRM_fixed(png_ptr, info_ptr, int_white_x, int_white_y,
2730 int_red_x, int_red_y, int_green_x, int_green_y,
2731 int_blue_x, int_blue_y)
2732 png_set_cHRM_XYZ_fixed(png_ptr, info_ptr, int_red_X, int_red_Y,
2733 int_red_Z, int_green_X, int_green_Y, int_green_Z,
2734 int_blue_X, int_blue_Y, int_blue_Z)
2736 {white,red,green,blue}_{x,y}
2737 A color space encoding specified using the chromaticities
2738 of the end points and the white point.
2740 {red,green,blue}_{X,Y,Z}
2741 A color space encoding specified using the encoding end
2742 points - the CIE tristimulus specification of the intended
2743 color of the red, green and blue channels in the PNG RGB
2744 data. The white point is simply the sum of the three end
2747 png_set_sRGB(png_ptr, info_ptr, srgb_intent);
2749 srgb_intent - the rendering intent
2750 (PNG_INFO_sRGB) The presence of
2751 the sRGB chunk means that the pixel
2752 data is in the sRGB color space.
2753 This chunk also implies specific
2754 values of gAMA and cHRM. Rendering
2755 intent is the CSS-1 property that
2756 has been defined by the International
2758 (http://www.color.org).
2760 PNG_sRGB_INTENT_SATURATION,
2761 PNG_sRGB_INTENT_PERCEPTUAL,
2762 PNG_sRGB_INTENT_ABSOLUTE, or
2763 PNG_sRGB_INTENT_RELATIVE.
2766 png_set_sRGB_gAMA_and_cHRM(png_ptr, info_ptr,
2769 srgb_intent - the rendering intent
2770 (PNG_INFO_sRGB) The presence of the
2771 sRGB chunk means that the pixel
2772 data is in the sRGB color space.
2773 This function also causes gAMA and
2774 cHRM chunks with the specific values
2775 that are consistent with sRGB to be
2778 png_set_iCCP(png_ptr, info_ptr, name, compression_type,
2781 name - The profile name.
2783 compression_type - The compression type; always
2784 PNG_COMPRESSION_TYPE_BASE for PNG 1.0.
2785 You may give NULL to this argument to
2788 profile - International Color Consortium color
2789 profile data. May contain NULs.
2791 proflen - length of profile data in bytes.
2793 png_set_sBIT(png_ptr, info_ptr, sig_bit);
2795 sig_bit - the number of significant bits for
2796 (PNG_INFO_sBIT) each of the gray, red,
2797 green, and blue channels, whichever are
2798 appropriate for the given color type
2801 png_set_tRNS(png_ptr, info_ptr, trans_alpha,
2802 num_trans, trans_color);
2804 trans_alpha - array of alpha (transparency)
2805 entries for palette (PNG_INFO_tRNS)
2807 num_trans - number of transparent entries
2810 trans_color - graylevel or color sample values
2811 (in order red, green, blue) of the
2812 single transparent color for
2813 non-paletted images (PNG_INFO_tRNS)
2815 png_set_hIST(png_ptr, info_ptr, hist);
2817 hist - histogram of palette (array of
2818 png_uint_16) (PNG_INFO_hIST)
2820 png_set_tIME(png_ptr, info_ptr, mod_time);
2822 mod_time - time image was last modified
2825 png_set_bKGD(png_ptr, info_ptr, background);
2827 background - background color (of type
2828 png_color_16p) (PNG_VALID_bKGD)
2830 png_set_text(png_ptr, info_ptr, text_ptr, num_text);
2832 text_ptr - array of png_text holding image
2835 text_ptr[i].compression - type of compression used
2836 on "text" PNG_TEXT_COMPRESSION_NONE
2837 PNG_TEXT_COMPRESSION_zTXt
2838 PNG_ITXT_COMPRESSION_NONE
2839 PNG_ITXT_COMPRESSION_zTXt
2840 text_ptr[i].key - keyword for comment. Must contain
2842 text_ptr[i].text - text comments for current
2843 keyword. Can be NULL or empty.
2844 text_ptr[i].text_length - length of text string,
2845 after decompression, 0 for iTXt
2846 text_ptr[i].itxt_length - length of itxt string,
2847 after decompression, 0 for tEXt/zTXt
2848 text_ptr[i].lang - language of comment (NULL or
2850 text_ptr[i].translated_keyword - keyword in UTF-8 (NULL
2851 or empty for unknown).
2852 Note that the itxt_length, lang, and lang_key
2853 members of the text_ptr structure only exist
2854 when the library is built with iTXt chunk support.
2855 Prior to libpng-1.4.0 the library was built by default
2856 without iTXt support.
2858 num_text - number of comments
2860 png_set_sPLT(png_ptr, info_ptr, &palette_ptr,
2863 palette_ptr - array of png_sPLT_struct structures
2864 to be added to the list of palettes
2865 in the info structure.
2866 num_spalettes - number of palette structures to be
2869 png_set_oFFs(png_ptr, info_ptr, offset_x, offset_y,
2872 offset_x - positive offset from the left
2875 offset_y - positive offset from the top
2878 unit_type - PNG_OFFSET_PIXEL, PNG_OFFSET_MICROMETER
2880 png_set_pHYs(png_ptr, info_ptr, res_x, res_y,
2883 res_x - pixels/unit physical resolution
2886 res_y - pixels/unit physical resolution
2889 unit_type - PNG_RESOLUTION_UNKNOWN,
2890 PNG_RESOLUTION_METER
2892 png_set_sCAL(png_ptr, info_ptr, unit, width, height)
2894 unit - physical scale units (an integer)
2896 width - width of a pixel in physical scale units
2898 height - height of a pixel in physical scale units
2899 (width and height are doubles)
2901 png_set_sCAL_s(png_ptr, info_ptr, unit, width, height)
2903 unit - physical scale units (an integer)
2905 width - width of a pixel in physical scale units
2906 expressed as a string
2908 height - height of a pixel in physical scale units
2909 (width and height are strings like "2.54")
2911 png_set_unknown_chunks(png_ptr, info_ptr, &unknowns,
2914 unknowns - array of png_unknown_chunk
2915 structures holding unknown chunks
2916 unknowns[i].name - name of unknown chunk
2917 unknowns[i].data - data of unknown chunk
2918 unknowns[i].size - size of unknown chunk's data
2919 unknowns[i].location - position to write chunk in file
2920 0: do not write chunk
2921 PNG_HAVE_IHDR: before PLTE
2922 PNG_HAVE_PLTE: before IDAT
2923 PNG_AFTER_IDAT: after IDAT
2925 The "location" member is set automatically according to
2926 what part of the output file has already been written.
2927 You can change its value after calling png_set_unknown_chunks()
2928 as demonstrated in pngtest.c. Within each of the "locations",
2929 the chunks are sequenced according to their position in the
2930 structure (that is, the value of "i", which is the order in which
2931 the chunk was either read from the input file or defined with
2932 png_set_unknown_chunks).
2934 A quick word about text and num_text. text is an array of png_text
2935 structures. num_text is the number of valid structures in the array.
2936 Each png_text structure holds a language code, a keyword, a text value,
2937 and a compression type.
2939 The compression types have the same valid numbers as the compression
2940 types of the image data. Currently, the only valid number is zero.
2941 However, you can store text either compressed or uncompressed, unlike
2942 images, which always have to be compressed. So if you don't want the
2943 text compressed, set the compression type to PNG_TEXT_COMPRESSION_NONE.
2944 Because tEXt and zTXt chunks don't have a language field, if you
2945 specify PNG_TEXT_COMPRESSION_NONE or PNG_TEXT_COMPRESSION_zTXt
2946 any language code or translated keyword will not be written out.
2948 Until text gets around a few hundred bytes, it is not worth compressing it.
2949 After the text has been written out to the file, the compression type
2950 is set to PNG_TEXT_COMPRESSION_NONE_WR or PNG_TEXT_COMPRESSION_zTXt_WR,
2951 so that it isn't written out again at the end (in case you are calling
2952 png_write_end() with the same struct).
2954 The keywords that are given in the PNG Specification are:
2956 Title Short (one line) title or
2959 Author Name of image's creator
2961 Description Description of image (possibly long)
2963 Copyright Copyright notice
2965 Creation Time Time of original image creation
2966 (usually RFC 1123 format, see below)
2968 Software Software used to create the image
2970 Disclaimer Legal disclaimer
2972 Warning Warning of nature of content
2974 Source Device used to create the image
2976 Comment Miscellaneous comment; conversion
2977 from other image format
2979 The keyword-text pairs work like this. Keywords should be short
2980 simple descriptions of what the comment is about. Some typical
2981 keywords are found in the PNG specification, as is some recommendations
2982 on keywords. You can repeat keywords in a file. You can even write
2983 some text before the image and some after. For example, you may want
2984 to put a description of the image before the image, but leave the
2985 disclaimer until after, so viewers working over modem connections
2986 don't have to wait for the disclaimer to go over the modem before
2987 they start seeing the image. Finally, keywords should be full
2988 words, not abbreviations. Keywords and text are in the ISO 8859-1
2989 (Latin-1) character set (a superset of regular ASCII) and can not
2990 contain NUL characters, and should not contain control or other
2991 unprintable characters. To make the comments widely readable, stick
2992 with basic ASCII, and avoid machine specific character set extensions
2993 like the IBM-PC character set. The keyword must be present, but
2994 you can leave off the text string on non-compressed pairs.
2995 Compressed pairs must have a text string, as only the text string
2996 is compressed anyway, so the compression would be meaningless.
2998 PNG supports modification time via the png_time structure. Two
2999 conversion routines are provided, png_convert_from_time_t() for
3000 time_t and png_convert_from_struct_tm() for struct tm. The
3001 time_t routine uses gmtime(). You don't have to use either of
3002 these, but if you wish to fill in the png_time structure directly,
3003 you should provide the time in universal time (GMT) if possible
3004 instead of your local time. Note that the year number is the full
3005 year (e.g. 1998, rather than 98 - PNG is year 2000 compliant!), and
3006 that months start with 1.
3008 If you want to store the time of the original image creation, you should
3009 use a plain tEXt chunk with the "Creation Time" keyword. This is
3010 necessary because the "creation time" of a PNG image is somewhat vague,
3011 depending on whether you mean the PNG file, the time the image was
3012 created in a non-PNG format, a still photo from which the image was
3013 scanned, or possibly the subject matter itself. In order to facilitate
3014 machine-readable dates, it is recommended that the "Creation Time"
3015 tEXt chunk use RFC 1123 format dates (e.g. "22 May 1997 18:07:10 GMT"),
3016 although this isn't a requirement. Unlike the tIME chunk, the
3017 "Creation Time" tEXt chunk is not expected to be automatically changed
3018 by the software. To facilitate the use of RFC 1123 dates, a function
3019 png_convert_to_rfc1123(png_timep) is provided to convert from PNG
3020 time to an RFC 1123 format string.
3022 Writing unknown chunks
3024 You can use the png_set_unknown_chunks function to queue up chunks
3025 for writing. You give it a chunk name, raw data, and a size; that's
3026 all there is to it. The chunks will be written by the next following
3027 png_write_info_before_PLTE, png_write_info, or png_write_end function.
3028 Any chunks previously read into the info structure's unknown-chunk
3029 list will also be written out in a sequence that satisfies the PNG
3030 specification's ordering rules.
3032 The high-level write interface
3034 At this point there are two ways to proceed; through the high-level
3035 write interface, or through a sequence of low-level write operations.
3036 You can use the high-level interface if your image data is present
3037 in the info structure. All defined output
3038 transformations are permitted, enabled by the following masks.
3040 PNG_TRANSFORM_IDENTITY No transformation
3041 PNG_TRANSFORM_PACKING Pack 1, 2 and 4-bit samples
3042 PNG_TRANSFORM_PACKSWAP Change order of packed
3044 PNG_TRANSFORM_INVERT_MONO Invert monochrome images
3045 PNG_TRANSFORM_SHIFT Normalize pixels to the
3047 PNG_TRANSFORM_BGR Flip RGB to BGR, RGBA
3049 PNG_TRANSFORM_SWAP_ALPHA Flip RGBA to ARGB or GA
3051 PNG_TRANSFORM_INVERT_ALPHA Change alpha from opacity
3053 PNG_TRANSFORM_SWAP_ENDIAN Byte-swap 16-bit samples
3054 PNG_TRANSFORM_STRIP_FILLER Strip out filler
3056 PNG_TRANSFORM_STRIP_FILLER_BEFORE Strip out leading
3058 PNG_TRANSFORM_STRIP_FILLER_AFTER Strip out trailing
3061 If you have valid image data in the info structure (you can use
3062 png_set_rows() to put image data in the info structure), simply do this:
3064 png_write_png(png_ptr, info_ptr, png_transforms, NULL)
3066 where png_transforms is an integer containing the bitwise OR of some set of
3067 transformation flags. This call is equivalent to png_write_info(),
3068 followed the set of transformations indicated by the transform mask,
3069 then png_write_image(), and finally png_write_end().
3071 (The final parameter of this call is not yet used. Someday it might point
3072 to transformation parameters required by some future output transform.)
3074 You must use png_transforms and not call any png_set_transform() functions
3075 when you use png_write_png().
3077 The low-level write interface
3079 If you are going the low-level route instead, you are now ready to
3080 write all the file information up to the actual image data. You do
3081 this with a call to png_write_info().
3083 png_write_info(png_ptr, info_ptr);
3085 Note that there is one transformation you may need to do before
3086 png_write_info(). In PNG files, the alpha channel in an image is the
3087 level of opacity. If your data is supplied as a level of transparency,
3088 you can invert the alpha channel before you write it, so that 0 is
3089 fully transparent and 255 (in 8-bit or paletted images) or 65535
3090 (in 16-bit images) is fully opaque, with
3092 png_set_invert_alpha(png_ptr);
3094 This must appear before png_write_info() instead of later with the
3095 other transformations because in the case of paletted images the tRNS
3096 chunk data has to be inverted before the tRNS chunk is written. If
3097 your image is not a paletted image, the tRNS data (which in such cases
3098 represents a single color to be rendered as transparent) won't need to
3099 be changed, and you can safely do this transformation after your
3100 png_write_info() call.
3102 If you need to write a private chunk that you want to appear before
3103 the PLTE chunk when PLTE is present, you can write the PNG info in
3104 two steps, and insert code to write your own chunk between them:
3106 png_write_info_before_PLTE(png_ptr, info_ptr);
3107 png_set_unknown_chunks(png_ptr, info_ptr, ...);
3108 png_write_info(png_ptr, info_ptr);
3110 After you've written the file information, you can set up the library
3111 to handle any special transformations of the image data. The various
3112 ways to transform the data will be described in the order that they
3113 should occur. This is important, as some of these change the color
3114 type and/or bit depth of the data, and some others only work on
3115 certain color types and bit depths. Even though each transformation
3116 checks to see if it has data that it can do something with, you should
3117 make sure to only enable a transformation if it will be valid for the
3118 data. For example, don't swap red and blue on grayscale data.
3120 PNG files store RGB pixels packed into 3 or 6 bytes. This code tells
3121 the library to strip input data that has 4 or 8 bytes per pixel down
3122 to 3 or 6 bytes (or strip 2 or 4-byte grayscale+filler data to 1 or 2
3125 png_set_filler(png_ptr, 0, PNG_FILLER_BEFORE);
3127 where the 0 is unused, and the location is either PNG_FILLER_BEFORE or
3128 PNG_FILLER_AFTER, depending upon whether the filler byte in the pixel
3129 is stored XRGB or RGBX.
3131 PNG files pack pixels of bit depths 1, 2, and 4 into bytes as small as
3132 they can, resulting in, for example, 8 pixels per byte for 1 bit files.
3133 If the data is supplied at 1 pixel per byte, use this code, which will
3134 correctly pack the pixels into a single byte:
3136 png_set_packing(png_ptr);
3138 PNG files reduce possible bit depths to 1, 2, 4, 8, and 16. If your
3139 data is of another bit depth, you can write an sBIT chunk into the
3140 file so that decoders can recover the original data if desired.
3142 /* Set the true bit depth of the image data */
3143 if (color_type & PNG_COLOR_MASK_COLOR)
3145 sig_bit.red = true_bit_depth;
3146 sig_bit.green = true_bit_depth;
3147 sig_bit.blue = true_bit_depth;
3152 sig_bit.gray = true_bit_depth;
3155 if (color_type & PNG_COLOR_MASK_ALPHA)
3157 sig_bit.alpha = true_bit_depth;
3160 png_set_sBIT(png_ptr, info_ptr, &sig_bit);
3162 If the data is stored in the row buffer in a bit depth other than
3163 one supported by PNG (e.g. 3 bit data in the range 0-7 for a 4-bit PNG),
3164 this will scale the values to appear to be the correct bit depth as
3167 png_set_shift(png_ptr, &sig_bit);
3169 PNG files store 16-bit pixels in network byte order (big-endian,
3170 ie. most significant bits first). This code would be used if they are
3171 supplied the other way (little-endian, i.e. least significant bits
3172 first, the way PCs store them):
3175 png_set_swap(png_ptr);
3177 If you are using packed-pixel images (1, 2, or 4 bits/pixel), and you
3178 need to change the order the pixels are packed into bytes, you can use:
3181 png_set_packswap(png_ptr);
3183 PNG files store 3 color pixels in red, green, blue order. This code
3184 would be used if they are supplied as blue, green, red:
3186 png_set_bgr(png_ptr);
3188 PNG files describe monochrome as black being zero and white being
3189 one. This code would be used if the pixels are supplied with this reversed
3190 (black being one and white being zero):
3192 png_set_invert_mono(png_ptr);
3194 Finally, you can write your own transformation function if none of
3195 the existing ones meets your needs. This is done by setting a callback
3198 png_set_write_user_transform_fn(png_ptr,
3199 write_transform_fn);
3201 You must supply the function
3203 void write_transform_fn(png_structp png_ptr, png_row_infop
3204 row_info, png_bytep data)
3206 See pngtest.c for a working example. Your function will be called
3207 before any of the other transformations are processed. If supported
3208 libpng also supplies an information routine that may be called from
3211 png_get_current_row_number(png_ptr);
3212 png_get_current_pass_number(png_ptr);
3214 This returns the current row passed to the transform. With interlaced
3215 images the value returned is the row in the input sub-image image. Use
3216 PNG_ROW_FROM_PASS_ROW(row, pass) and PNG_COL_FROM_PASS_COL(col, pass) to
3217 find the output pixel (x,y) given an interlaced sub-image pixel (row,col,pass).
3219 The discussion of interlace handling above contains more information on how to
3222 You can also set up a pointer to a user structure for use by your
3225 png_set_user_transform_info(png_ptr, user_ptr, 0, 0);
3227 The user_channels and user_depth parameters of this function are ignored
3228 when writing; you can set them to zero as shown.
3230 You can retrieve the pointer via the function png_get_user_transform_ptr().
3233 voidp write_user_transform_ptr =
3234 png_get_user_transform_ptr(png_ptr);
3236 It is possible to have libpng flush any pending output, either manually,
3237 or automatically after a certain number of lines have been written. To
3238 flush the output stream a single time call:
3240 png_write_flush(png_ptr);
3242 and to have libpng flush the output stream periodically after a certain
3243 number of scanlines have been written, call:
3245 png_set_flush(png_ptr, nrows);
3247 Note that the distance between rows is from the last time png_write_flush()
3248 was called, or the first row of the image if it has never been called.
3249 So if you write 50 lines, and then png_set_flush 25, it will flush the
3250 output on the next scanline, and every 25 lines thereafter, unless
3251 png_write_flush() is called before 25 more lines have been written.
3252 If nrows is too small (less than about 10 lines for a 640 pixel wide
3253 RGB image) the image compression may decrease noticeably (although this
3254 may be acceptable for real-time applications). Infrequent flushing will
3255 only degrade the compression performance by a few percent over images
3256 that do not use flushing.
3258 Writing the image data
3260 That's it for the transformations. Now you can write the image data.
3261 The simplest way to do this is in one function call. If you have the
3262 whole image in memory, you can just call png_write_image() and libpng
3263 will write the image. You will need to pass in an array of pointers to
3264 each row. This function automatically handles interlacing, so you don't
3265 need to call png_set_interlace_handling() or call this function multiple
3266 times, or any of that other stuff necessary with png_write_rows().
3268 png_write_image(png_ptr, row_pointers);
3270 where row_pointers is:
3272 png_byte *row_pointers[height];
3274 You can point to void or char or whatever you use for pixels.
3276 If you don't want to write the whole image at once, you can
3277 use png_write_rows() instead. If the file is not interlaced,
3280 png_write_rows(png_ptr, row_pointers,
3283 row_pointers is the same as in the png_write_image() call.
3285 If you are just writing one row at a time, you can do this with
3286 a single row_pointer instead of an array of row_pointers:
3288 png_bytep row_pointer = row;
3290 png_write_row(png_ptr, row_pointer);
3292 When the file is interlaced, things can get a good deal more complicated.
3293 The only currently (as of the PNG Specification version 1.2, dated July
3294 1999) defined interlacing scheme for PNG files is the "Adam7" interlace
3295 scheme, that breaks down an image into seven smaller images of varying
3296 size. libpng will build these images for you, or you can do them
3297 yourself. If you want to build them yourself, see the PNG specification
3298 for details of which pixels to write when.
3300 If you don't want libpng to handle the interlacing details, just
3301 use png_set_interlace_handling() and call png_write_rows() the
3302 correct number of times to write all the sub-images
3303 (png_set_interlace_handling() returns the number of sub-images.)
3305 If you want libpng to build the sub-images, call this before you start
3308 number_of_passes = png_set_interlace_handling(png_ptr);
3310 This will return the number of passes needed. Currently, this is seven,
3311 but may change if another interlace type is added.
3313 Then write the complete image number_of_passes times.
3315 png_write_rows(png_ptr, row_pointers, number_of_rows);
3317 Think carefully before you write an interlaced image. Typically code that
3318 reads such images reads all the image data into memory, uncompressed, before
3319 doing any processing. Only code that can display an image on the fly can
3320 take advantage of the interlacing and even then the image has to be exactly
3321 the correct size for the output device, because scaling an image requires
3322 adjacent pixels and these are not available until all the passes have been
3325 If you do write an interlaced image you will hardly ever need to handle
3326 the interlacing yourself. Call png_set_interlace_handling() and use the
3327 approach described above.
3329 The only time it is conceivable that you will really need to write an
3330 interlaced image pass-by-pass is when you have read one pass by pass and
3331 made some pixel-by-pixel transformation to it, as described in the read
3332 code above. In this case use the PNG_PASS_ROWS and PNG_PASS_COLS macros
3333 to determine the size of each sub-image in turn and simply write the rows
3334 you obtained from the read code.
3336 Finishing a sequential write
3338 After you are finished writing the image, you should finish writing
3339 the file. If you are interested in writing comments or time, you should
3340 pass an appropriately filled png_info pointer. If you are not interested,
3343 png_write_end(png_ptr, info_ptr);
3345 When you are done, you can free all memory used by libpng like this:
3347 png_destroy_write_struct(&png_ptr, &info_ptr);
3349 It is also possible to individually free the info_ptr members that
3350 point to libpng-allocated storage with the following function:
3352 png_free_data(png_ptr, info_ptr, mask, seq)
3354 mask - identifies data to be freed, a mask
3355 containing the bitwise OR of one or
3357 PNG_FREE_PLTE, PNG_FREE_TRNS,
3358 PNG_FREE_HIST, PNG_FREE_ICCP,
3359 PNG_FREE_PCAL, PNG_FREE_ROWS,
3360 PNG_FREE_SCAL, PNG_FREE_SPLT,
3361 PNG_FREE_TEXT, PNG_FREE_UNKN,
3362 or simply PNG_FREE_ALL
3364 seq - sequence number of item to be freed
3367 This function may be safely called when the relevant storage has
3368 already been freed, or has not yet been allocated, or was allocated
3369 by the user and not by libpng, and will in those cases do nothing.
3370 The "seq" parameter is ignored if only one item of the selected data
3371 type, such as PLTE, is allowed. If "seq" is not -1, and multiple items
3372 are allowed for the data type identified in the mask, such as text or
3373 sPLT, only the n'th item in the structure is freed, where n is "seq".
3375 If you allocated data such as a palette that you passed in to libpng
3376 with png_set_*, you must not free it until just before the call to
3377 png_destroy_write_struct().
3379 The default behavior is only to free data that was allocated internally
3380 by libpng. This can be changed, so that libpng will not free the data,
3381 or so that it will free data that was allocated by the user with png_malloc()
3382 or png_zalloc() and passed in via a png_set_*() function, with
3384 png_data_freer(png_ptr, info_ptr, freer, mask)
3387 PNG_DESTROY_WILL_FREE_DATA
3388 PNG_SET_WILL_FREE_DATA
3389 PNG_USER_WILL_FREE_DATA
3391 mask - which data elements are affected
3392 same choices as in png_free_data()
3394 For example, to transfer responsibility for some data from a read structure
3395 to a write structure, you could use
3397 png_data_freer(read_ptr, read_info_ptr,
3398 PNG_USER_WILL_FREE_DATA,
3399 PNG_FREE_PLTE|PNG_FREE_tRNS|PNG_FREE_hIST)
3401 png_data_freer(write_ptr, write_info_ptr,
3402 PNG_DESTROY_WILL_FREE_DATA,
3403 PNG_FREE_PLTE|PNG_FREE_tRNS|PNG_FREE_hIST)
3405 thereby briefly reassigning responsibility for freeing to the user but
3406 immediately afterwards reassigning it once more to the write_destroy
3407 function. Having done this, it would then be safe to destroy the read
3408 structure and continue to use the PLTE, tRNS, and hIST data in the write
3411 This function only affects data that has already been allocated.
3412 You can call this function before calling after the png_set_*() functions
3413 to control whether the user or png_destroy_*() is supposed to free the data.
3414 When the user assumes responsibility for libpng-allocated data, the
3415 application must use
3416 png_free() to free it, and when the user transfers responsibility to libpng
3417 for data that the user has allocated, the user must have used png_malloc()
3418 or png_zalloc() to allocate it.
3420 If you allocated text_ptr.text, text_ptr.lang, and text_ptr.translated_keyword
3421 separately, do not transfer responsibility for freeing text_ptr to libpng,
3422 because when libpng fills a png_text structure it combines these members with
3423 the key member, and png_free_data() will free only text_ptr.key. Similarly,
3424 if you transfer responsibility for free'ing text_ptr from libpng to your
3425 application, your application must not separately free those members.
3426 For a more compact example of writing a PNG image, see the file example.c.
3428 V. Modifying/Customizing libpng:
3430 There are two issues here. The first is changing how libpng does
3431 standard things like memory allocation, input/output, and error handling.
3432 The second deals with more complicated things like adding new chunks,
3433 adding new transformations, and generally changing how libpng works.
3434 Both of those are compile-time issues; that is, they are generally
3435 determined at the time the code is written, and there is rarely a need
3436 to provide the user with a means of changing them.
3438 Memory allocation, input/output, and error handling
3440 All of the memory allocation, input/output, and error handling in libpng
3441 goes through callbacks that are user-settable. The default routines are
3442 in pngmem.c, pngrio.c, pngwio.c, and pngerror.c, respectively. To change
3443 these functions, call the appropriate png_set_*_fn() function.
3445 Memory allocation is done through the functions png_malloc(), png_calloc(),
3446 and png_free(). These currently just call the standard C functions.
3447 png_calloc() calls png_malloc() and then clears the newly
3448 allocated memory to zero. There is limited support for certain systems
3449 with segmented memory architectures and the types of pointers declared by
3450 png.h match this; you will have to use appropriate pointers in your
3451 application. Since it is
3452 unlikely that the method of handling memory allocation on a platform
3453 will change between applications, these functions must be modified in
3454 the library at compile time. If you prefer to use a different method
3455 of allocating and freeing data, you can use png_create_read_struct_2() or
3456 png_create_write_struct_2() to register your own functions as described
3457 above. These functions also provide a void pointer that can be retrieved
3460 mem_ptr=png_get_mem_ptr(png_ptr);
3462 Your replacement memory functions must have prototypes as follows:
3464 png_voidp malloc_fn(png_structp png_ptr,
3465 png_alloc_size_t size);
3467 void free_fn(png_structp png_ptr, png_voidp ptr);
3469 Your malloc_fn() must return NULL in case of failure. The png_malloc()
3470 function will normally call png_error() if it receives a NULL from the
3471 system memory allocator or from your replacement malloc_fn().
3473 Your free_fn() will never be called with a NULL ptr, since libpng's
3474 png_free() checks for NULL before calling free_fn().
3476 Input/Output in libpng is done through png_read() and png_write(),
3477 which currently just call fread() and fwrite(). The FILE * is stored in
3478 png_struct and is initialized via png_init_io(). If you wish to change
3479 the method of I/O, the library supplies callbacks that you can set
3480 through the function png_set_read_fn() and png_set_write_fn() at run
3481 time, instead of calling the png_init_io() function. These functions
3482 also provide a void pointer that can be retrieved via the function
3483 png_get_io_ptr(). For example:
3485 png_set_read_fn(png_structp read_ptr,
3486 voidp read_io_ptr, png_rw_ptr read_data_fn)
3488 png_set_write_fn(png_structp write_ptr,
3489 voidp write_io_ptr, png_rw_ptr write_data_fn,
3490 png_flush_ptr output_flush_fn);
3492 voidp read_io_ptr = png_get_io_ptr(read_ptr);
3493 voidp write_io_ptr = png_get_io_ptr(write_ptr);
3495 The replacement I/O functions must have prototypes as follows:
3497 void user_read_data(png_structp png_ptr,
3498 png_bytep data, png_size_t length);
3500 void user_write_data(png_structp png_ptr,
3501 png_bytep data, png_size_t length);
3503 void user_flush_data(png_structp png_ptr);
3505 The user_read_data() function is responsible for detecting and
3506 handling end-of-data errors.
3508 Supplying NULL for the read, write, or flush functions sets them back
3509 to using the default C stream functions, which expect the io_ptr to
3510 point to a standard *FILE structure. It is probably a mistake
3511 to use NULL for one of write_data_fn and output_flush_fn but not both
3512 of them, unless you have built libpng with PNG_NO_WRITE_FLUSH defined.
3513 It is an error to read from a write stream, and vice versa.
3515 Error handling in libpng is done through png_error() and png_warning().
3516 Errors handled through png_error() are fatal, meaning that png_error()
3517 should never return to its caller. Currently, this is handled via
3518 setjmp() and longjmp() (unless you have compiled libpng with
3519 PNG_NO_SETJMP, in which case it is handled via PNG_ABORT()),
3520 but you could change this to do things like exit() if you should wish,
3521 as long as your function does not return.
3523 On non-fatal errors, png_warning() is called
3524 to print a warning message, and then control returns to the calling code.
3525 By default png_error() and png_warning() print a message on stderr via
3526 fprintf() unless the library is compiled with PNG_NO_CONSOLE_IO defined
3527 (because you don't want the messages) or PNG_NO_STDIO defined (because
3528 fprintf() isn't available). If you wish to change the behavior of the error
3529 functions, you will need to set up your own message callbacks. These
3530 functions are normally supplied at the time that the png_struct is created.
3531 It is also possible to redirect errors and warnings to your own replacement
3532 functions after png_create_*_struct() has been called by calling:
3534 png_set_error_fn(png_structp png_ptr,
3535 png_voidp error_ptr, png_error_ptr error_fn,
3536 png_error_ptr warning_fn);
3538 png_voidp error_ptr = png_get_error_ptr(png_ptr);
3540 If NULL is supplied for either error_fn or warning_fn, then the libpng
3541 default function will be used, calling fprintf() and/or longjmp() if a
3542 problem is encountered. The replacement error functions should have
3543 parameters as follows:
3545 void user_error_fn(png_structp png_ptr,
3546 png_const_charp error_msg);
3548 void user_warning_fn(png_structp png_ptr,
3549 png_const_charp warning_msg);
3551 The motivation behind using setjmp() and longjmp() is the C++ throw and
3552 catch exception handling methods. This makes the code much easier to write,
3553 as there is no need to check every return code of every function call.
3554 However, there are some uncertainties about the status of local variables
3555 after a longjmp, so the user may want to be careful about doing anything
3556 after setjmp returns non-zero besides returning itself. Consult your
3557 compiler documentation for more details. For an alternative approach, you
3558 may wish to use the "cexcept" facility (see http://cexcept.sourceforge.net),
3559 which is illustrated in pngvalid.c and in contrib/visupng.
3563 If you need to read or write custom chunks, you may need to get deeper
3564 into the libpng code. The library now has mechanisms for storing
3565 and writing chunks of unknown type; you can even declare callbacks
3566 for custom chunks. However, this may not be good enough if the
3567 library code itself needs to know about interactions between your
3568 chunk and existing `intrinsic' chunks.
3570 If you need to write a new intrinsic chunk, first read the PNG
3571 specification. Acquire a first level of understanding of how it works.
3572 Pay particular attention to the sections that describe chunk names,
3573 and look at how other chunks were designed, so you can do things
3574 similarly. Second, check out the sections of libpng that read and
3575 write chunks. Try to find a chunk that is similar to yours and use
3576 it as a template. More details can be found in the comments inside
3577 the code. It is best to handle private or unknown chunks in a generic method,
3578 via callback functions, instead of by modifying libpng functions. This
3579 is illustrated in pngtest.c, which uses a callback function to handle a
3580 private "vpAg" chunk and the new "sTER" chunk, which are both unknown to
3583 If you wish to write your own transformation for the data, look through
3584 the part of the code that does the transformations, and check out some of
3585 the simpler ones to get an idea of how they work. Try to find a similar
3586 transformation to the one you want to add and copy off of it. More details
3587 can be found in the comments inside the code itself.
3589 Configuring for 16-bit platforms
3591 You will want to look into zconf.h to tell zlib (and thus libpng) that
3592 it cannot allocate more then 64K at a time. Even if you can, the memory
3593 won't be accessible. So limit zlib and libpng to 64K by defining MAXSEG_64K.
3597 For DOS users who only have access to the lower 640K, you will
3598 have to limit zlib's memory usage via a png_set_compression_mem_level()
3599 call. See zlib.h or zconf.h in the zlib library for more information.
3601 Configuring for Medium Model
3603 Libpng's support for medium model has been tested on most of the popular
3604 compilers. Make sure MAXSEG_64K gets defined, USE_FAR_KEYWORD gets
3605 defined, and FAR gets defined to far in pngconf.h, and you should be
3606 all set. Everything in the library (except for zlib's structure) is
3607 expecting far data. You must use the typedefs with the p or pp on
3608 the end for pointers (or at least look at them and be careful). Make
3609 note that the rows of data are defined as png_bytepp, which is
3610 an "unsigned char far * far *".
3612 Configuring for gui/windowing platforms:
3614 You will need to write new error and warning functions that use the GUI
3615 interface, as described previously, and set them to be the error and
3616 warning functions at the time that png_create_*_struct() is called,
3617 in order to have them available during the structure initialization.
3618 They can be changed later via png_set_error_fn(). On some compilers,
3619 you may also have to change the memory allocators (png_malloc, etc.).
3621 Configuring for compiler xxx:
3623 All includes for libpng are in pngconf.h. If you need to add, change
3624 or delete an include, this is the place to do it.
3625 The includes that are not needed outside libpng are placed in pngpriv.h,
3626 which is only used by the routines inside libpng itself.
3627 The files in libpng proper only include pngpriv.h and png.h, which
3628 in turn includes pngconf.h and, as of libpng-1.5.0, pnglibconf.h.
3629 As of libpng-1.5.0, pngpriv.h also includes three other private header
3630 files, pngstruct.h, pnginfo.h, and pngdebug.h, which contain material
3631 that previously appeared in the public headers.
3635 There are special functions to configure the compression. Perhaps the
3636 most useful one changes the compression level, which currently uses
3637 input compression values in the range 0 - 9. The library normally
3638 uses the default compression level (Z_DEFAULT_COMPRESSION = 6). Tests
3639 have shown that for a large majority of images, compression values in
3640 the range 3-6 compress nearly as well as higher levels, and do so much
3641 faster. For online applications it may be desirable to have maximum speed
3642 (Z_BEST_SPEED = 1). With versions of zlib after v0.99, you can also
3643 specify no compression (Z_NO_COMPRESSION = 0), but this would create
3644 files larger than just storing the raw bitmap. You can specify the
3645 compression level by calling:
3648 png_set_compression_level(png_ptr, level);
3650 Another useful one is to reduce the memory level used by the library.
3651 The memory level defaults to 8, but it can be lowered if you are
3652 short on memory (running DOS, for example, where you only have 640K).
3653 Note that the memory level does have an effect on compression; among
3654 other things, lower levels will result in sections of incompressible
3655 data being emitted in smaller stored blocks, with a correspondingly
3656 larger relative overhead of up to 15% in the worst case.
3659 png_set_compression_mem_level(png_ptr, level);
3661 The other functions are for configuring zlib. They are not recommended
3662 for normal use and may result in writing an invalid PNG file. See
3663 zlib.h for more information on what these mean.
3666 png_set_compression_strategy(png_ptr,
3669 png_set_compression_window_bits(png_ptr,
3672 png_set_compression_method(png_ptr, method);
3674 png_set_compression_buffer_size(png_ptr, size);
3676 As of libpng version 1.5.4, additional APIs became
3677 available to set these separately for non-IDAT
3678 compressed chunks such as zTXt, iTXt, and iCCP:
3681 #if PNG_LIBPNG_VER <= 10504
3682 png_set_text_compression_level(png_ptr, level);
3684 png_set_text_compression_mem_level(png_ptr, level);
3686 png_set_text_compression_strategy(png_ptr,
3689 png_set_text_compression_window_bits(png_ptr,
3692 png_set_text_compression_method(png_ptr, method);
3695 Controlling row filtering
3697 If you want to control whether libpng uses filtering or not, which
3698 filters are used, and how it goes about picking row filters, you
3699 can call one of these functions. The selection and configuration
3700 of row filters can have a significant impact on the size and
3701 encoding speed and a somewhat lesser impact on the decoding speed
3702 of an image. Filtering is enabled by default for RGB and grayscale
3703 images (with and without alpha), but not for paletted images nor
3704 for any images with bit depths less than 8 bits/pixel.
3706 The 'method' parameter sets the main filtering method, which is
3707 currently only '0' in the PNG 1.2 specification. The 'filters'
3708 parameter sets which filter(s), if any, should be used for each
3709 scanline. Possible values are PNG_ALL_FILTERS and PNG_NO_FILTERS
3710 to turn filtering on and off, respectively.
3712 Individual filter types are PNG_FILTER_NONE, PNG_FILTER_SUB,
3713 PNG_FILTER_UP, PNG_FILTER_AVG, PNG_FILTER_PAETH, which can be bitwise
3714 ORed together with '|' to specify one or more filters to use.
3715 These filters are described in more detail in the PNG specification.
3716 If you intend to change the filter type during the course of writing
3717 the image, you should start with flags set for all of the filters
3718 you intend to use so that libpng can initialize its internal
3719 structures appropriately for all of the filter types. (Note that this
3720 means the first row must always be adaptively filtered, because libpng
3721 currently does not allocate the filter buffers until png_write_row()
3722 is called for the first time.)
3724 filters = PNG_FILTER_NONE | PNG_FILTER_SUB
3725 PNG_FILTER_UP | PNG_FILTER_AVG |
3726 PNG_FILTER_PAETH | PNG_ALL_FILTERS;
3728 png_set_filter(png_ptr, PNG_FILTER_TYPE_BASE,
3730 The second parameter can also be
3731 PNG_INTRAPIXEL_DIFFERENCING if you are
3732 writing a PNG to be embedded in a MNG
3733 datastream. This parameter must be the
3734 same as the value of filter_method used
3737 It is also possible to influence how libpng chooses from among the
3738 available filters. This is done in one or both of two ways - by
3739 telling it how important it is to keep the same filter for successive
3740 rows, and by telling it the relative computational costs of the filters.
3742 double weights[3] = {1.5, 1.3, 1.1},
3743 costs[PNG_FILTER_VALUE_LAST] =
3744 {1.0, 1.3, 1.3, 1.5, 1.7};
3746 png_set_filter_heuristics(png_ptr,
3747 PNG_FILTER_HEURISTIC_WEIGHTED, 3,
3750 The weights are multiplying factors that indicate to libpng that the
3751 row filter should be the same for successive rows unless another row filter
3752 is that many times better than the previous filter. In the above example,
3753 if the previous 3 filters were SUB, SUB, NONE, the SUB filter could have a
3754 "sum of absolute differences" 1.5 x 1.3 times higher than other filters
3755 and still be chosen, while the NONE filter could have a sum 1.1 times
3756 higher than other filters and still be chosen. Unspecified weights are
3757 taken to be 1.0, and the specified weights should probably be declining
3758 like those above in order to emphasize recent filters over older filters.
3760 The filter costs specify for each filter type a relative decoding cost
3761 to be considered when selecting row filters. This means that filters
3762 with higher costs are less likely to be chosen over filters with lower
3763 costs, unless their "sum of absolute differences" is that much smaller.
3764 The costs do not necessarily reflect the exact computational speeds of
3765 the various filters, since this would unduly influence the final image
3768 Note that the numbers above were invented purely for this example and
3769 are given only to help explain the function usage. Little testing has
3770 been done to find optimum values for either the costs or the weights.
3772 Removing unwanted object code
3774 There are a bunch of #define's in pngconf.h that control what parts of
3775 libpng are compiled. All the defines end in _SUPPORTED. If you are
3776 never going to use a capability, you can change the #define to #undef
3777 before recompiling libpng and save yourself code and data space, or
3778 you can turn off individual capabilities with defines that begin with
3781 In libpng-1.5.0 and later, the #define's are in pnglibconf.h instead.
3783 You can also turn all of the transforms and ancillary chunk capabilities
3784 off en masse with compiler directives that define
3785 PNG_NO_READ[or WRITE]_TRANSFORMS, or PNG_NO_READ[or WRITE]_ANCILLARY_CHUNKS,
3787 along with directives to turn on any of the capabilities that you do
3788 want. The PNG_NO_READ[or WRITE]_TRANSFORMS directives disable the extra
3789 transformations but still leave the library fully capable of reading
3790 and writing PNG files with all known public chunks. Use of the
3791 PNG_NO_READ[or WRITE]_ANCILLARY_CHUNKS directive produces a library
3792 that is incapable of reading or writing ancillary chunks. If you are
3793 not using the progressive reading capability, you can turn that off
3794 with PNG_NO_PROGRESSIVE_READ (don't confuse this with the INTERLACING
3795 capability, which you'll still have).
3797 All the reading and writing specific code are in separate files, so the
3798 linker should only grab the files it needs. However, if you want to
3799 make sure, or if you are building a stand alone library, all the
3800 reading files start with "pngr" and all the writing files start with "pngw".
3801 The files that don't match either (like png.c, pngtrans.c, etc.)
3802 are used for both reading and writing, and always need to be included.
3803 The progressive reader is in pngpread.c
3805 If you are creating or distributing a dynamically linked library (a .so
3806 or DLL file), you should not remove or disable any parts of the library,
3807 as this will cause applications linked with different versions of the
3808 library to fail if they call functions not available in your library.
3809 The size of the library itself should not be an issue, because only
3810 those sections that are actually used will be loaded into memory.
3812 Requesting debug printout
3814 The macro definition PNG_DEBUG can be used to request debugging
3815 printout. Set it to an integer value in the range 0 to 3. Higher
3816 numbers result in increasing amounts of debugging information. The
3817 information is printed to the "stderr" file, unless another file
3818 name is specified in the PNG_DEBUG_FILE macro definition.
3820 When PNG_DEBUG > 0, the following functions (macros) become available:
3822 png_debug(level, message)
3823 png_debug1(level, message, p1)
3824 png_debug2(level, message, p1, p2)
3826 in which "level" is compared to PNG_DEBUG to decide whether to print
3827 the message, "message" is the formatted string to be printed,
3828 and p1 and p2 are parameters that are to be embedded in the string
3829 according to printf-style formatting directives. For example,
3831 png_debug1(2, "foo=%d\n", foo);
3836 fprintf(PNG_DEBUG_FILE, "foo=%d\n", foo);
3838 When PNG_DEBUG is defined but is zero, the macros aren't defined, but you
3839 can still use PNG_DEBUG to control your own debugging:
3845 When PNG_DEBUG = 1, the macros are defined, but only png_debug statements
3846 having level = 0 will be printed. There aren't any such statements in
3847 this version of libpng, but if you insert some they will be printed.
3851 The MNG specification (available at http://www.libpng.org/pub/mng) allows
3852 certain extensions to PNG for PNG images that are embedded in MNG datastreams.
3853 Libpng can support some of these extensions. To enable them, use the
3854 png_permit_mng_features() function:
3856 feature_set = png_permit_mng_features(png_ptr, mask)
3858 mask is a png_uint_32 containing the bitwise OR of the
3859 features you want to enable. These include
3860 PNG_FLAG_MNG_EMPTY_PLTE
3861 PNG_FLAG_MNG_FILTER_64
3862 PNG_ALL_MNG_FEATURES
3864 feature_set is a png_uint_32 that is the bitwise AND of
3865 your mask with the set of MNG features that is
3866 supported by the version of libpng that you are using.
3868 It is an error to use this function when reading or writing a standalone
3869 PNG file with the PNG 8-byte signature. The PNG datastream must be wrapped
3870 in a MNG datastream. As a minimum, it must have the MNG 8-byte signature
3871 and the MHDR and MEND chunks. Libpng does not provide support for these
3872 or any other MNG chunks; your application must provide its own support for
3873 them. You may wish to consider using libmng (available at
3874 http://www.libmng.com) instead.
3876 VII. Changes to Libpng from version 0.88
3878 It should be noted that versions of libpng later than 0.96 are not
3879 distributed by the original libpng author, Guy Schalnat, nor by
3880 Andreas Dilger, who had taken over from Guy during 1996 and 1997, and
3881 distributed versions 0.89 through 0.96, but rather by another member
3882 of the original PNG Group, Glenn Randers-Pehrson. Guy and Andreas are
3883 still alive and well, but they have moved on to other things.
3885 The old libpng functions png_read_init(), png_write_init(),
3886 png_info_init(), png_read_destroy(), and png_write_destroy() have been
3887 moved to PNG_INTERNAL in version 0.95 to discourage their use. These
3888 functions will be removed from libpng version 1.4.0.
3890 The preferred method of creating and initializing the libpng structures is
3891 via the png_create_read_struct(), png_create_write_struct(), and
3892 png_create_info_struct() because they isolate the size of the structures
3893 from the application, allow version error checking, and also allow the
3894 use of custom error handling routines during the initialization, which
3895 the old functions do not. The functions png_read_destroy() and
3896 png_write_destroy() do not actually free the memory that libpng
3897 allocated for these structs, but just reset the data structures, so they
3898 can be used instead of png_destroy_read_struct() and
3899 png_destroy_write_struct() if you feel there is too much system overhead
3900 allocating and freeing the png_struct for each image read.
3902 Setting the error callbacks via png_set_message_fn() before
3903 png_read_init() as was suggested in libpng-0.88 is no longer supported
3904 because this caused applications that do not use custom error functions
3905 to fail if the png_ptr was not initialized to zero. It is still possible
3906 to set the error callbacks AFTER png_read_init(), or to change them with
3907 png_set_error_fn(), which is essentially the same function, but with a new
3908 name to force compilation errors with applications that try to use the old
3911 Starting with version 1.0.7, you can find out which version of the library
3912 you are using at run-time:
3914 png_uint_32 libpng_vn = png_access_version_number();
3916 The number libpng_vn is constructed from the major version, minor
3917 version with leading zero, and release number with leading zero,
3918 (e.g., libpng_vn for version 1.0.7 is 10007).
3920 Note that this function does not take a png_ptr, so you can call it
3921 before you've created one.
3923 You can also check which version of png.h you used when compiling your
3926 png_uint_32 application_vn = PNG_LIBPNG_VER;
3928 VIII. Changes to Libpng from version 1.0.x to 1.2.x
3930 Support for user memory management was enabled by default. To
3931 accomplish this, the functions png_create_read_struct_2(),
3932 png_create_write_struct_2(), png_set_mem_fn(), png_get_mem_ptr(),
3933 png_malloc_default(), and png_free_default() were added.
3935 Support for the iTXt chunk has been enabled by default as of
3938 Support for certain MNG features was enabled.
3940 Support for numbered error messages was added. However, we never got
3941 around to actually numbering the error messages. The function
3942 png_set_strip_error_numbers() was added (Note: the prototype for this
3943 function was inadvertently removed from png.h in PNG_NO_ASSEMBLER_CODE
3944 builds of libpng-1.2.15. It was restored in libpng-1.2.36).
3946 The png_malloc_warn() function was added at libpng-1.2.3. This issues
3947 a png_warning and returns NULL instead of aborting when it fails to
3948 acquire the requested memory allocation.
3950 Support for setting user limits on image width and height was enabled
3951 by default. The functions png_set_user_limits(), png_get_user_width_max(),
3952 and png_get_user_height_max() were added at libpng-1.2.6.
3954 The png_set_add_alpha() function was added at libpng-1.2.7.
3956 The function png_set_expand_gray_1_2_4_to_8() was added at libpng-1.2.9.
3957 Unlike png_set_gray_1_2_4_to_8(), the new function does not expand the
3958 tRNS chunk to alpha. The png_set_gray_1_2_4_to_8() function is
3961 A number of macro definitions in support of runtime selection of
3962 assembler code features (especially Intel MMX code support) were
3963 added at libpng-1.2.0:
3965 PNG_ASM_FLAG_MMX_SUPPORT_COMPILED
3966 PNG_ASM_FLAG_MMX_SUPPORT_IN_CPU
3967 PNG_ASM_FLAG_MMX_READ_COMBINE_ROW
3968 PNG_ASM_FLAG_MMX_READ_INTERLACE
3969 PNG_ASM_FLAG_MMX_READ_FILTER_SUB
3970 PNG_ASM_FLAG_MMX_READ_FILTER_UP
3971 PNG_ASM_FLAG_MMX_READ_FILTER_AVG
3972 PNG_ASM_FLAG_MMX_READ_FILTER_PAETH
3973 PNG_ASM_FLAGS_INITIALIZED
3979 We added the following functions in support of runtime
3980 selection of assembler code features:
3982 png_get_mmx_flagmask()
3983 png_set_mmx_thresholds()
3985 png_get_mmx_bitdepth_threshold()
3986 png_get_mmx_rowbytes_threshold()
3989 We replaced all of these functions with simple stubs in libpng-1.2.20,
3990 when the Intel assembler code was removed due to a licensing issue.
3992 These macros are deprecated:
3994 PNG_READ_TRANSFORMS_NOT_SUPPORTED
3995 PNG_PROGRESSIVE_READ_NOT_SUPPORTED
3996 PNG_NO_SEQUENTIAL_READ_SUPPORTED
3997 PNG_WRITE_TRANSFORMS_NOT_SUPPORTED
3998 PNG_READ_ANCILLARY_CHUNKS_NOT_SUPPORTED
3999 PNG_WRITE_ANCILLARY_CHUNKS_NOT_SUPPORTED
4001 They have been replaced, respectively, by:
4003 PNG_NO_READ_TRANSFORMS
4004 PNG_NO_PROGRESSIVE_READ
4005 PNG_NO_SEQUENTIAL_READ
4006 PNG_NO_WRITE_TRANSFORMS
4007 PNG_NO_READ_ANCILLARY_CHUNKS
4008 PNG_NO_WRITE_ANCILLARY_CHUNKS
4010 PNG_MAX_UINT was replaced with PNG_UINT_31_MAX. It has been
4011 deprecated since libpng-1.0.16 and libpng-1.2.6.
4014 png_check_sig(sig, num)
4016 !png_sig_cmp(sig, 0, num)
4017 It has been deprecated since libpng-0.90.
4020 png_set_gray_1_2_4_to_8()
4021 which also expands tRNS to alpha was replaced with
4022 png_set_expand_gray_1_2_4_to_8()
4023 which does not. It has been deprecated since libpng-1.0.18 and 1.2.9.
4025 IX. Changes to Libpng from version 1.0.x/1.2.x to 1.4.x
4027 Private libpng prototypes and macro definitions were moved from
4028 png.h and pngconf.h into a new pngpriv.h header file.
4030 Functions png_set_benign_errors(), png_benign_error(), and
4031 png_chunk_benign_error() were added.
4033 Support for setting the maximum amount of memory that the application
4034 will allocate for reading chunks was added, as a security measure.
4035 The functions png_set_chunk_cache_max() and png_get_chunk_cache_max()
4036 were added to the library.
4038 We implemented support for I/O states by adding png_ptr member io_state
4039 and functions png_get_io_chunk_name() and png_get_io_state() in pngget.c
4041 We added PNG_TRANSFORM_GRAY_TO_RGB to the available high-level
4044 Checking for and reporting of errors in the IHDR chunk is more thorough.
4046 Support for global arrays was removed, to improve thread safety.
4048 Some obsolete/deprecated macros and functions have been removed.
4050 Typecasted NULL definitions such as
4051 #define png_voidp_NULL (png_voidp)NULL
4052 were eliminated. If you used these in your application, just use
4055 The png_struct and info_struct members "trans" and "trans_values" were
4056 changed to "trans_alpha" and "trans_color", respectively.
4058 The obsolete, unused pnggccrd.c and pngvcrd.c files and related makefiles
4061 The PNG_1_0_X and PNG_1_2_X macros were eliminated.
4063 The PNG_LEGACY_SUPPORTED macro was eliminated.
4065 Many WIN32_WCE #ifdefs were removed.
4067 The functions png_read_init(info_ptr), png_write_init(info_ptr),
4068 png_info_init(info_ptr), png_read_destroy(), and png_write_destroy()
4069 have been removed. They have been deprecated since libpng-0.95.
4071 The png_permit_empty_plte() was removed. It has been deprecated
4072 since libpng-1.0.9. Use png_permit_mng_features() instead.
4074 We removed the obsolete stub functions png_get_mmx_flagmask(),
4075 png_set_mmx_thresholds(), png_get_asm_flags(),
4076 png_get_mmx_bitdepth_threshold(), png_get_mmx_rowbytes_threshold(),
4077 png_set_asm_flags(), and png_mmx_supported()
4079 We removed the obsolete png_check_sig(), png_memcpy_check(), and
4080 png_memset_check() functions. Instead use !png_sig_cmp(), memcpy(),
4081 and memset(), respectively.
4083 The function png_set_gray_1_2_4_to_8() was removed. It has been
4084 deprecated since libpng-1.0.18 and 1.2.9, when it was replaced with
4085 png_set_expand_gray_1_2_4_to_8() because the former function also
4086 expanded any tRNS chunk to an alpha channel.
4088 Macros for png_get_uint_16, png_get_uint_32, and png_get_int_32
4089 were added and are used by default instead of the corresponding
4090 functions. Unfortunately,
4091 from libpng-1.4.0 until 1.4.4, the png_get_uint_16 macro (but not the
4092 function) incorrectly returned a value of type png_uint_32.
4094 We changed the prototype for png_malloc() from
4095 png_malloc(png_structp png_ptr, png_uint_32 size)
4097 png_malloc(png_structp png_ptr, png_alloc_size_t size)
4099 This also applies to the prototype for the user replacement malloc_fn().
4101 The png_calloc() function was added and is used in place of
4102 of "png_malloc(); memset();" except in the case in png_read_png()
4103 where the array consists of pointers; in this case a "for" loop is used
4104 after the png_malloc() to set the pointers to NULL, to give robust.
4105 behavior in case the application runs out of memory part-way through
4108 We changed the prototypes of png_get_compression_buffer_size() and
4109 png_set_compression_buffer_size() to work with png_size_t instead of
4112 Support for numbered error messages was removed by default, since we
4113 never got around to actually numbering the error messages. The function
4114 png_set_strip_error_numbers() was removed from the library by default.
4116 The png_zalloc() and png_zfree() functions are no longer exported.
4117 The png_zalloc() function no longer zeroes out the memory that it
4120 Support for dithering was disabled by default in libpng-1.4.0, because
4121 it has not been well tested and doesn't actually "dither".
4123 removed, however, and could be enabled by building libpng with
4124 PNG_READ_DITHER_SUPPORTED defined. In libpng-1.4.2, this support
4125 was reenabled, but the function was renamed png_set_quantize() to
4126 reflect more accurately what it actually does. At the same time,
4127 the PNG_DITHER_[RED,GREEN_BLUE]_BITS macros were also renamed to
4128 PNG_QUANTIZE_[RED,GREEN,BLUE]_BITS, and PNG_READ_DITHER_SUPPORTED
4129 was renamed to PNG_READ_QUANTIZE_SUPPORTED.
4131 We removed the trailing '.' from the warning and error messages.
4133 X. Changes to Libpng from version 1.4.x to 1.5.x
4135 From libpng-1.4.0 until 1.4.4, the png_get_uint_16 macro (but not the
4136 function) incorrectly returned a value of type png_uint_32.
4138 A. Changes that affect users of libpng
4140 There are no substantial API changes between the non-deprecated parts of
4141 the 1.4.5 API and the 1.5.0 API, however the ability to directly access
4142 the main libpng control structures, png_struct and png_info, deprecated
4143 in earlier versions of libpng, has been completely removed from
4146 We no longer include zlib.h in png.h. Applications that need access
4147 to information in zlib.h will need to add the '#include "zlib.h"'
4148 directive. It does not matter whether it is placed prior to or after
4149 the '"#include png.h"' directive.
4151 We moved the png_strcpy(), png_strncpy(), png_strlen(), png_memcpy(),
4152 png_memcmp(), png_sprintf, and png_memcpy() macros into a private
4153 header file (pngpriv.h) that is not accessible to applications.
4155 In png_get_iCCP, the type of "profile" was changed from png_charpp
4156 to png_bytepp, and in png_set_iCCP, from png_charp to png_const_bytep.
4158 There are changes of form in png.h, including new and changed macros to
4159 declare parts of the API. Some API functions with arguments that are
4160 pointers to data not modified within the function have been corrected to
4161 declare these arguments with PNG_CONST.
4163 Much of the internal use of C macros to control the library build has also
4164 changed and some of this is visible in the exported header files, in
4165 particular the use of macros to control data and API elements visible
4166 during application compilation may require significant revision to
4167 application code. (It is extremely rare for an application to do this.)
4169 Any program that compiled against libpng 1.4 and did not use deprecated
4170 features or access internal library structures should compile and work
4171 against libpng 1.5, except for the change in the prototype for
4172 png_get_iCCP() and png_set_iCCP() API functions mentioned above.
4174 libpng 1.5.0 adds PNG_ PASS macros to help in the reading and writing of
4175 interlaced images. The macros return the number of rows and columns in
4176 each pass and information that can be used to de-interlace and (if
4177 absolutely necessary) interlace an image.
4179 libpng 1.5.0 adds an API png_longjmp(png_ptr, value). This API calls
4180 the application-provided png_longjmp_ptr on the internal, but application
4181 initialized, longjmp buffer. It is provided as a convenience to avoid
4182 the need to use the png_jmpbuf macro, which had the unnecessary side
4183 effect of resetting the internal png_longjmp_ptr value.
4185 libpng 1.5.0 includes a complete fixed point API. By default this is
4186 present along with the corresponding floating point API. In general the
4187 fixed point API is faster and smaller than the floating point one because
4188 the PNG file format used fixed point, not floating point. This applies
4189 even if the library uses floating point in internal calculations. A new
4190 macro, PNG_FLOATING_ARITHMETIC_SUPPORTED, reveals whether the library
4191 uses floating point arithmetic (the default) or fixed point arithmetic
4192 internally for performance critical calculations such as gamma correction.
4193 In some cases, the gamma calculations may produce slightly different
4194 results. This has changed the results in png_rgb_to_gray and in alpha
4195 composition (png_set_background for example). This applies even if the
4196 original image was already linear (gamma == 1.0) and, therefore, it is
4197 not necessary to linearize the image. This is because libpng has *not*
4198 been changed to optimize that case correctly, yet.
4200 Fixed point support for the sCAL chunk comes with an important caveat;
4201 the sCAL specification uses a decimal encoding of floating point values
4202 and the accuracy of PNG fixed point values is insufficient for
4203 representation of these values. Consequently a "string" API
4204 (png_get_sCAL_s and png_set_sCAL_s) is the only reliable way of reading
4205 arbitrary sCAL chunks in the absence of either the floating point API or
4206 internal floating point calculations.
4208 Applications no longer need to include the optional distribution header
4209 file pngusr.h or define the corresponding macros during application
4210 build in order to see the correct variant of the libpng API. From 1.5.0
4211 application code can check for the corresponding _SUPPORTED macro:
4213 #ifdef PNG_INCH_CONVERSIONS_SUPPORTED
4214 /* code that uses the inch conversion APIs. */
4217 This macro will only be defined if the inch conversion functions have been
4218 compiled into libpng. The full set of macros, and whether or not support
4219 has been compiled in, are available in the header file pnglibconf.h.
4220 This header file is specific to the libpng build. Notice that prior to
4221 1.5.0 the _SUPPORTED macros would always have the default definition unless
4222 reset by pngusr.h or by explicit settings on the compiler command line.
4223 These settings may produce compiler warnings or errors in 1.5.0 because
4224 of macro redefinition.
4226 From libpng-1.4.0 until 1.4.4, the png_get_uint_16 macro (but not the
4227 function) incorrectly returned a value of type png_uint_32. libpng 1.5.0
4228 is consistent with the implementation in 1.4.5 and 1.2.x (where the macro
4231 Applications can now choose whether to use these macros or to call the
4232 corresponding function by defining PNG_USE_READ_MACROS or
4233 PNG_NO_USE_READ_MACROS before including png.h. Notice that this is
4234 only supported from 1.5.0 -defining PNG_NO_USE_READ_MACROS prior to 1.5.0
4235 will lead to a link failure.
4237 Prior to libpng-1.5.4, the zlib compressor used the same set of parameters
4238 when compressing the IDAT data and textual data such as zTXt and iCCP.
4239 In libpng-1.5.4 we reinitialized the zlib stream for each type of data.
4240 We added five png_set_text_*() functions for setting the parameters to
4241 use with textual data.
4243 Prior to libpng-1.5.4, the PNG_READ_16_TO_8_ACCURATE_SCALE_SUPPORTED
4244 option was off by default, and slightly inaccurate scaling occurred.
4245 This option can no longer be turned off, and the choice of accurate
4246 or inaccurate 16-to-8 scaling is by using the new png_set_scale_16_to_8()
4247 API for accurate scaling or the old png_set_strip_16_to_8() API for simple
4250 Prior to libpng-1.5.4, the png_set_user_limits() function could only be
4251 used to reduce the width and height limits from the value of
4252 PNG_USER_WIDTH_MAX and PNG_USER_HEIGHT_MAX, although this document said
4253 that it could be used to override them. Now this function will reduce or
4254 increase the limits.
4256 B. Changes to the build and configuration of libpng
4258 Details of internal changes to the library code can be found in the CHANGES
4259 file and in the GIT repository logs. These will be of no concern to the vast
4260 majority of library users or builders, however the few who configure libpng
4261 to a non-default feature set may need to change how this is done.
4263 There should be no need for library builders to alter build scripts if
4264 these use the distributed build support - configure or the makefiles -
4265 however users of the makefiles may care to update their build scripts
4266 to build pnglibconf.h where the corresponding makefile does not do so.
4268 Building libpng with a non-default configuration has changed completely.
4269 The old method using pngusr.h should still work correctly even though the
4270 way pngusr.h is used in the build has been changed; however, library
4271 builders will probably want to examine the changes to take advantage of
4272 new capabilities and to simplify their build system.
4274 B.1 Specific changes to library configuration capabilities
4276 The library now supports a complete fixed point implementation and can
4277 thus be used on systems that have no floating point support or very
4278 limited or slow support. Previously gamma correction, an essential part
4279 of complete PNG support, required reasonably fast floating point.
4281 As part of this the choice of internal implementation has been made
4282 independent of the choice of fixed versus floating point APIs and all the
4283 missing fixed point APIs have been implemented.
4285 The exact mechanism used to control attributes of API functions has
4286 changed. A single set of operating system independent macro definitions
4287 is used and operating system specific directives are defined in
4290 As part of this the mechanism used to choose procedure call standards on
4291 those systems that allow a choice has been changed. At present this only
4292 affects certain Microsoft (DOS, Windows) and IBM (OS/2) operating systems
4293 running on Intel processors. As before, PNGAPI is defined where required
4294 to control the exported API functions; however, two new macros, PNGCBAPI
4295 and PNGCAPI, are used instead for callback functions (PNGCBAPI) and
4296 (PNGCAPI) for functions that must match a C library prototype (currently
4297 only png_longjmp_ptr, which must match the C longjmp function.) The new
4298 approach is documented in pngconf.h
4300 Despite these changes, libpng 1.5.0 only supports the native C function
4301 calling standard on those platforms tested so far (__cdecl on Microsoft
4302 Windows). This is because the support requirements for alternative
4303 calling conventions seem to no longer exist. Developers who find it
4304 necessary to set PNG_API_RULE to 1 should advise the mailing list
4305 (png-mng-implement) of this and library builders who use Openwatcom and
4306 therefore set PNG_API_RULE to 2 should also contact the mailing list.
4308 A new test program, pngvalid, is provided in addition to pngtest.
4309 pngvalid validates the arithmetic accuracy of the gamma correction
4310 calculations and includes a number of validations of the file format.
4311 A subset of the full range of tests is run when "make check" is done
4312 (in the 'configure' build.) pngvalid also allows total allocated memory
4313 usage to be evaluated and performs additional memory overwrite validation.
4315 Many changes to individual feature macros have been made. The following
4316 are the changes most likely to be noticed by library builders who
4319 1) All feature macros now have consistent naming:
4321 #define PNG_NO_feature turns the feature off
4322 #define PNG_feature_SUPPORTED turns the feature on
4324 pnglibconf.h contains one line for each feature macro which is either:
4326 #define PNG_feature_SUPPORTED
4328 if the feature is supported or:
4330 /*#undef PNG_feature_SUPPORTED*/
4332 if it is not. Library code consistently checks for the 'SUPPORTED' macro.
4333 It does not, and libpng applications should not, check for the 'NO' macro
4334 which will not normally be defined even if the feature is not supported.
4335 The 'NO' macros are only used internally for setting or not setting the
4336 corresponding 'SUPPORTED' macros.
4338 Compatibility with the old names is provided as follows:
4340 PNG_INCH_CONVERSIONS turns on PNG_INCH_CONVERSIONS_SUPPORTED
4342 And the following definitions disable the corresponding feature:
4344 PNG_SETJMP_NOT_SUPPORTED disables SETJMP
4345 PNG_READ_TRANSFORMS_NOT_SUPPORTED disables READ_TRANSFORMS
4346 PNG_NO_READ_COMPOSITED_NODIV disables READ_COMPOSITE_NODIV
4347 PNG_WRITE_TRANSFORMS_NOT_SUPPORTED disables WRITE_TRANSFORMS
4348 PNG_READ_ANCILLARY_CHUNKS_NOT_SUPPORTED disables READ_ANCILLARY_CHUNKS
4349 PNG_WRITE_ANCILLARY_CHUNKS_NOT_SUPPORTED disables WRITE_ANCILLARY_CHUNKS
4351 Library builders should remove use of the above, inconsistent, names.
4353 2) Warning and error message formatting was previously conditional on
4354 the STDIO feature. The library has been changed to use the
4355 CONSOLE_IO feature instead. This means that if CONSOLE_IO is disabled
4356 the library no longer uses the printf(3) functions, even though the
4357 default read/write implementations use (FILE) style stdio.h functions.
4359 3) Three feature macros now control the fixed/floating point decisions:
4361 PNG_FLOATING_POINT_SUPPORTED enables the floating point APIs
4363 PNG_FIXED_POINT_SUPPORTED enables the fixed point APIs; however, in
4364 practice these are normally required internally anyway (because the PNG
4365 file format is fixed point), therefore in most cases PNG_NO_FIXED_POINT
4366 merely stops the function from being exported.
4368 PNG_FLOATING_ARITHMETIC_SUPPORTED chooses between the internal floating
4369 point implementation or the fixed point one. Typically the fixed point
4370 implementation is larger and slower than the floating point implementation
4371 on a system that supports floating point, however it may be faster on a
4372 system which lacks floating point hardware and therefore uses a software
4375 4) Added PNG_{READ,WRITE}_INT_FUNCTIONS_SUPPORTED. This allows the
4376 functions to read and write ints to be disabled independently of
4377 PNG_USE_READ_MACROS, which allows libpng to be built with the functions
4378 even though the default is to use the macros - this allows applications
4379 to choose at app buildtime whether or not to use macros (previously
4380 impossible because the functions weren't in the default build.)
4382 B.2 Changes to the configuration mechanism
4384 Prior to libpng-1.5.0 library builders who needed to configure libpng
4385 had either to modify the exported pngconf.h header file to add system
4386 specific configuration or had to write feature selection macros into
4387 pngusr.h and cause this to be included into pngconf.h by defining
4388 PNG_USER_CONFIG. The latter mechanism had the disadvantage that an
4389 application built without PNG_USER_CONFIG defined would see the
4390 unmodified, default, libpng API and thus would probably fail to link.
4392 These mechanisms still work in the configure build and in any makefile
4393 build that builds pnglibconf.h, although the feature selection macros
4394 have changed somewhat as described above. In 1.5.0, however, pngusr.h is
4395 processed only once, when the exported header file pnglibconf.h is built.
4396 pngconf.h no longer includes pngusr.h, therefore pngusr.h is ignored after the
4397 build of pnglibconf.h and it is never included in an application build.
4399 The rarely used alternative of adding a list of feature macros to the
4400 CFLAGS setting in the build also still works, however the macros will be
4401 copied to pnglibconf.h and this may produce macro redefinition warnings
4402 when the individual C files are compiled.
4404 All configuration now only works if pnglibconf.h is built from
4405 scripts/pnglibconf.dfa. This requires the program awk. Brian Kernighan
4406 (the original author of awk) maintains C source code of that awk and this
4407 and all known later implementations (often called by subtly different
4408 names - nawk and gawk for example) are adequate to build pnglibconf.h.
4409 The Sun Microsystems (now Oracle) program 'awk' is an earlier version
4410 and does not work; this may also apply to other systems that have a
4411 functioning awk called 'nawk'.
4413 Configuration options are now documented in scripts/pnglibconf.dfa. This
4414 file also includes dependency information that ensures a configuration is
4415 consistent; that is, if a feature is switched off dependent features are
4416 also removed. As a recommended alternative to using feature macros in
4417 pngusr.h a system builder may also define equivalent options in pngusr.dfa
4418 (or, indeed, any file) and add that to the configuration by setting
4419 DFA_XTRA to the file name. The makefiles in contrib/pngminim illustrate
4420 how to do this, and a case where pngusr.h is still required.
4422 XI. Detecting libpng
4424 The png_get_io_ptr() function has been present since libpng-0.88, has never
4425 changed, and is unaffected by conditional compilation macros. It is the
4426 best choice for use in configure scripts for detecting the presence of any
4427 libpng version since 0.88. In an autoconf "configure.in" you could use
4429 AC_CHECK_LIB(png, png_get_io_ptr, ...
4431 XII. Source code repository
4433 Since about February 2009, version 1.2.34, libpng has been under "git" source
4434 control. The git repository was built from old libpng-x.y.z.tar.gz files
4435 going back to version 0.70. You can access the git repository (read only)
4438 git://libpng.git.sourceforge.net/gitroot/libpng
4440 or you can browse it via "gitweb" at
4442 http://libpng.git.sourceforge.net/git/gitweb.cgi?p=libpng
4444 Patches can be sent to glennrp at users.sourceforge.net or to
4445 png-mng-implement at lists.sourceforge.net or you can upload them to
4446 the libpng bug tracker at
4448 http://libpng.sourceforge.net
4450 We also accept patches built from the tar or zip distributions, and
4451 simple verbal discriptions of bug fixes, reported either to the
4452 SourceForge bug tracker, to the png-mng-implement at lists.sf.net
4453 mailing list, or directly to glennrp.
4457 Our coding style is similar to the "Allman" style, with curly
4458 braces on separate lines:
4465 else if (another condition)
4470 The braces can be omitted from simple one-line actions:
4475 We use 3-space indentation, except for continued statements which
4476 are usually indented the same as the first line of the statement
4477 plus four more spaces.
4479 For macro definitions we use 2-space indentation, always leaving the "#"
4480 in the first column.
4482 #ifndef PNG_NO_FEATURE
4483 # ifndef PNG_FEATURE_SUPPORTED
4484 # define PNG_FEATURE_SUPPORTED
4488 Comments appear with the leading "/*" at the same indentation as
4489 the statement that follows the comment:
4491 /* Single-line comment */
4494 /* This is a multiple-line
4499 Very short comments can be placed after the end of the statement
4500 to which they pertain:
4502 statement; /* comment */
4504 We don't use C++ style ("//") comments. We have, however,
4505 used them in the past in some now-abandoned MMX assembler
4508 Functions and their curly braces are not indented, and
4509 exported functions are marked with PNGAPI:
4511 /* This is a public function that is visible to
4512 * application programmers. It does thus-and-so.
4515 png_exported_function(png_ptr, png_info, foo)
4520 The prototypes for all exported functions appear in png.h,
4521 above the comment that says
4523 /* Maintainer: Put new public prototypes here ... */
4525 We mark all non-exported functions with "/* PRIVATE */"":
4528 png_non_exported_function(png_ptr, png_info, foo)
4533 The prototypes for non-exported functions (except for those in
4536 above the comment that says
4538 /* Maintainer: Put new private prototypes here ^ and in libpngpf.3 */
4540 To avoid polluting the global namespace, the names of all exported
4541 functions and variables begin with "png_", and all publicly visible C
4542 preprocessor macros begin with "PNG_". We request that applications that
4543 use libpng *not* begin any of their own symbols with either of these strings.
4545 We put a space after each comma and after each semicolon
4546 in "for" statements, and we put spaces before and after each
4547 C binary operator and after "for" or "while", and before
4548 "?". We don't put a space between a typecast and the expression
4549 being cast, nor do we put one between a function name and the
4550 left parenthesis that follows it:
4552 for (i = 2; i > 0; --i)
4553 y[i] = a(x) + (int)b;
4555 We prefer #ifdef and #ifndef to #if defined() and if !defined()
4556 when there is only one macro being tested.
4558 We prefer to express integers that are used as bit masks in hex format,
4559 with an even number of lower-case hex digits (e.g., 0x00, 0xff, 0x0100).
4561 We do not use the TAB character for indentation in the C sources.
4563 Lines do not exceed 80 characters.
4565 Other rules can be inferred by inspecting the libpng source.
4567 XIV. Y2K Compliance in libpng
4571 Since the PNG Development group is an ad-hoc body, we can't make
4572 an official declaration.
4574 This is your unofficial assurance that libpng from version 0.71 and
4575 upward through 1.5.6 are Y2K compliant. It is my belief that earlier
4576 versions were also Y2K compliant.
4578 Libpng only has three year fields. One is a 2-byte unsigned integer that
4579 will hold years up to 65535. The other two hold the date in text
4580 format, and will hold years up to 9999.
4583 "png_uint_16 year" in png_time_struct.
4586 "png_charp time_buffer" in png_struct and
4587 "near_time_buffer", which is a local character string in png.c.
4589 There are seven time-related functions:
4591 png_convert_to_rfc_1123() in png.c
4592 (formerly png_convert_to_rfc_1152() in error)
4593 png_convert_from_struct_tm() in pngwrite.c, called
4595 png_convert_from_time_t() in pngwrite.c
4596 png_get_tIME() in pngget.c
4597 png_handle_tIME() in pngrutil.c, called in pngread.c
4598 png_set_tIME() in pngset.c
4599 png_write_tIME() in pngwutil.c, called in pngwrite.c
4601 All appear to handle dates properly in a Y2K environment. The
4602 png_convert_from_time_t() function calls gmtime() to convert from system
4603 clock time, which returns (year - 1900), which we properly convert to
4604 the full 4-digit year. There is a possibility that applications using
4605 libpng are not passing 4-digit years into the png_convert_to_rfc_1123()
4606 function, or that they are incorrectly passing only a 2-digit year
4607 instead of "year - 1900" into the png_convert_from_struct_tm() function,
4608 but this is not under our control. The libpng documentation has always
4609 stated that it works with 4-digit years, and the APIs have been
4612 The tIME chunk itself is also Y2K compliant. It uses a 2-byte unsigned
4613 integer to hold the year, and can hold years as large as 65535.
4615 zlib, upon which libpng depends, is also Y2K compliant. It contains
4616 no date-related code.
4619 Glenn Randers-Pehrson
4621 PNG Development Group