This is a release which focuses on performance. Most shape classes now check
to see whether each sub-shape intersects with the current drawing region in
the raster, and skip rendering if this is the case. Text objects perform this
check at the level of individual character. This gives a significant
improvement in rendering time, particularly when working with smaller buffers,
for large Text objects, and when performing updates.
Additionally, profiling indicated that character lookup in bitmap font objects
was a major bottleneck for text rendering. Fonts now cache those lookups in a
dictionary. This can be turned off with an initialization option, and there is
a method to clear the cache if the memory is needed.
These changes add up to an order of magnitude speed improvement in some cases.
Additional improvements include:
- Text objects can now be vertically and horizontally aligned relative to the
geometry. - a new Window Shape that holds a subsurface that makes scrolling groups of
Shapes easier. - support for Waveshare Pico-ResTouch-LCD 2.8 displays, thanks to @JoGeDuBo.
- replace Roboto fonts with Ubuntu fonts, which render better at small sizes.
- additional examples and various small fixes.
Thanks
The following people contributed to this release:
What's Changed
- Bump version numbers to 0.3.dev by @corranwebster in #48
- Add sub-shape clipping by @corranwebster in #49
- Fast text rendering by @corranwebster in #50
- Add per-item alignment to text. by @corranwebster in #52
- Handle updating Text object alignments properly by @corranwebster in #53
- Add Window shape that holds a surface by @corranwebster in #56
- Replace Roboto fonts with Ubuntu fonts by @corranwebster in #57
- Improved handling of reset in ST7789 display by @corranwebster in #58
- Add an example using a Window and buttons to scroll text. by @corranwebster in #61
- Fix package file for recent updates. by @corranwebster in #62
- Add Waveshare Pico-ResTouch-LCD-2.8 support by @corranwebster in #60
- Fix Temperature Sensor example. by @corranwebster in #63
Full Changelog: 0.2...0.3
