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1IJG JPEG LIBRARY:  SYSTEM ARCHITECTURE
2
3This file was part of the Independent JPEG Group's software:
4Copyright (C) 1991-2012, Thomas G. Lane, Guido Vollbeding.
5It was modified by The libjpeg-turbo Project to include only information
6relevant to libjpeg-turbo.
7For conditions of distribution and use, see the accompanying README.ijg file.
8
9
10This file provides an overview of the architecture of the IJG JPEG software;
11that is, the functions of the various modules in the system and the interfaces
12between modules.  For more precise details about any data structure or calling
13convention, see the include files and comments in the source code.
14
15We assume that the reader is already somewhat familiar with the JPEG standard.
16The README.ijg file includes references for learning about JPEG.  The file
17libjpeg.txt describes the library from the viewpoint of an application
18programmer using the library; it's best to read that file before this one.
19Also, the file coderules.txt describes the coding style conventions we use.
20
21In this document, JPEG-specific terminology follows the JPEG standard:
22  A "component" means a color channel, e.g., Red or Luminance.
23  A "sample" is a single component value (i.e., one number in the image data).
24  A "coefficient" is a frequency coefficient (a DCT transform output number).
25  A "block" is an 8x8 group of samples or coefficients.
26  An "MCU" (minimum coded unit) is an interleaved set of blocks of size
27        determined by the sampling factors, or a single block in a
28        noninterleaved scan.
29We do not use the terms "pixel" and "sample" interchangeably.  When we say
30pixel, we mean an element of the full-size image, while a sample is an element
31of the downsampled image.  Thus the number of samples may vary across
32components while the number of pixels does not.  (This terminology is not used
33rigorously throughout the code, but it is used in places where confusion would
34otherwise result.)
35
36
37*** System features ***
38
39The IJG distribution contains two parts:
40  * A subroutine library for JPEG compression and decompression.
41  * cjpeg/djpeg, two sample applications that use the library to transform
42    JFIF JPEG files to and from several other image formats.
43cjpeg/djpeg are of no great intellectual complexity: they merely add a simple
44command-line user interface and I/O routines for several uncompressed image
45formats.  This document concentrates on the library itself.
46
47We desire the library to be capable of supporting all JPEG baseline, extended
48sequential, and progressive DCT processes.  Hierarchical processes are not
49supported.
50
51The library does not support the lossless (spatial) JPEG process.  Lossless
52JPEG shares little or no code with lossy JPEG, and would normally be used
53without the extensive pre- and post-processing provided by this library.
54We feel that lossless JPEG is better handled by a separate library.
55
56Within these limits, any set of compression parameters allowed by the JPEG
57spec should be readable for decompression.  (We can be more restrictive about
58what formats we can generate.)  Although the system design allows for all
59parameter values, some uncommon settings are not yet implemented and may
60never be; nonintegral sampling ratios are the prime example.  Furthermore,
61we treat 8-bit vs. 12-bit data precision as a compile-time switch, not a
62run-time option, because most machines can store 8-bit pixels much more
63compactly than 12-bit.
64
65By itself, the library handles only interchange JPEG datastreams --- in
66particular the widely used JFIF file format.  The library can be used by
67surrounding code to process interchange or abbreviated JPEG datastreams that
68are embedded in more complex file formats.  (For example, libtiff uses this
69library to implement JPEG compression within the TIFF file format.)
70
71The library includes a substantial amount of code that is not covered by the
72JPEG standard but is necessary for typical applications of JPEG.  These
73functions preprocess the image before JPEG compression or postprocess it after
74decompression.  They include colorspace conversion, downsampling/upsampling,
75and color quantization.  This code can be omitted if not needed.
76
77A wide range of quality vs. speed tradeoffs are possible in JPEG processing,
78and even more so in decompression postprocessing.  The decompression library
79provides multiple implementations that cover most of the useful tradeoffs,
80ranging from very-high-quality down to fast-preview operation.  On the
81compression side we have generally not provided low-quality choices, since
82compression is normally less time-critical.  It should be understood that the
83low-quality modes may not meet the JPEG standard's accuracy requirements;
84nonetheless, they are useful for viewers.
85
86
87*** System overview ***
88
89The compressor and decompressor are each divided into two main sections:
90the JPEG compressor or decompressor proper, and the preprocessing or
91postprocessing functions.  The interface between these two sections is the
92image data that Rec. ITU-T T.81 | ISO/IEC 10918-1 regards as its input or
93output: this data is in the colorspace to be used for compression, and it is
94downsampled to the sampling factors to be used.  The preprocessing and
95postprocessing steps are responsible for converting a normal image
96representation to or from this form.  (Those few applications that want to deal
97with YCbCr downsampled data can skip the preprocessing or postprocessing step.)
98
99Looking more closely, the compressor library contains the following main
100elements:
101
102  Preprocessing:
103    * Color space conversion (e.g., RGB to YCbCr).
104    * Edge expansion and downsampling.  Optionally, this step can do simple
105      smoothing --- this is often helpful for low-quality source data.
106  JPEG proper:
107    * MCU assembly, DCT, quantization.
108    * Entropy coding (sequential or progressive, Huffman or arithmetic).
109
110In addition to these modules we need overall control, marker generation,
111and support code (memory management & error handling).  There is also a
112module responsible for physically writing the output data --- typically
113this is just an interface to fwrite(), but some applications may need to
114do something else with the data.
115
116The decompressor library contains the following main elements:
117
118  JPEG proper:
119    * Entropy decoding (sequential or progressive, Huffman or arithmetic).
120    * Dequantization, inverse DCT, MCU disassembly.
121  Postprocessing:
122    * Upsampling.  Optionally, this step may be able to do more general
123      rescaling of the image.
124    * Color space conversion (e.g., YCbCr to RGB).  This step may also
125      provide gamma adjustment [ currently it does not ].
126    * Optional color quantization (e.g., reduction to 256 colors).
127    * Optional color precision reduction (e.g., 24-bit to 15-bit color).
128      [This feature is not currently implemented.]
129
130We also need overall control, marker parsing, and a data source module.
131The support code (memory management & error handling) can be shared with
132the compression half of the library.
133
134There may be several implementations of each of these elements, particularly
135in the decompressor, where a wide range of speed/quality tradeoffs is very
136useful.  It must be understood that some of the best speedups involve
137merging adjacent steps in the pipeline.  For example, upsampling, color space
138conversion, and color quantization might all be done at once when using a
139low-quality ordered-dither technique.  The system architecture is designed to
140allow such merging where appropriate.
141
142
143Note: it is convenient to regard edge expansion (padding to block boundaries)
144as a preprocessing/postprocessing function, even though
145Rec. ITU-T T.81 | ISO/IEC 10918-1 includes it in compression/decompression.  We
146do this because downsampling/upsampling can be simplified a little if they work
147on padded data: it's not necessary to have special cases at the right and
148bottom edges.  Therefore the interface buffer is always an integral number of
149blocks wide and high, and we expect compression preprocessing to pad the source
150data properly.  Padding will occur only to the next block (8-sample) boundary.
151In an interleaved-scan situation, additional dummy blocks may be used to fill
152out MCUs, but the MCU assembly and disassembly logic will create or discard
153these blocks internally.  (This is advantageous for speed reasons, since we
154avoid DCTing the dummy blocks.  It also permits a small reduction in file size,
155because the compressor can choose dummy block contents so as to minimize their
156size in compressed form.  Finally, it makes the interface buffer specification
157independent of whether the file is actually interleaved or not.)  Applications
158that wish to deal directly with the downsampled data must provide similar
159buffering and padding for odd-sized images.
160
161
162*** Poor man's object-oriented programming ***
163
164It should be clear by now that we have a lot of quasi-independent processing
165steps, many of which have several possible behaviors.  To avoid cluttering the
166code with lots of switch statements, we use a simple form of object-style
167programming to separate out the different possibilities.
168
169For example, two different color quantization algorithms could be implemented
170as two separate modules that present the same external interface; at runtime,
171the calling code will access the proper module indirectly through an "object".
172
173We can get the limited features we need while staying within portable C.
174The basic tool is a function pointer.  An "object" is just a struct
175containing one or more function pointer fields, each of which corresponds to
176a method name in real object-oriented languages.  During initialization we
177fill in the function pointers with references to whichever module we have
178determined we need to use in this run.  Then invocation of the module is done
179by indirecting through a function pointer; on most machines this is no more
180expensive than a switch statement, which would be the only other way of
181making the required run-time choice.  The really significant benefit, of
182course, is keeping the source code clean and well structured.
183
184We can also arrange to have private storage that varies between different
185implementations of the same kind of object.  We do this by making all the
186module-specific object structs be separately allocated entities, which will
187be accessed via pointers in the master compression or decompression struct.
188The "public" fields or methods for a given kind of object are specified by
189a commonly known struct.  But a module's initialization code can allocate
190a larger struct that contains the common struct as its first member, plus
191additional private fields.  With appropriate pointer casting, the module's
192internal functions can access these private fields.  (For a simple example,
193see jdatadst.c, which implements the external interface specified by struct
194jpeg_destination_mgr, but adds extra fields.)
195
196(Of course this would all be a lot easier if we were using C++, but we are
197not yet prepared to assume that everyone has a C++ compiler.)
198
199An important benefit of this scheme is that it is easy to provide multiple
200versions of any method, each tuned to a particular case.  While a lot of
201precalculation might be done to select an optimal implementation of a method,
202the cost per invocation is constant.  For example, the upsampling step might
203have a "generic" method, plus one or more "hardwired" methods for the most
204popular sampling factors; the hardwired methods would be faster because they'd
205use straight-line code instead of for-loops.  The cost to determine which
206method to use is paid only once, at startup, and the selection criteria are
207hidden from the callers of the method.
208
209This plan differs a little bit from usual object-oriented structures, in that
210only one instance of each object class will exist during execution.  The
211reason for having the class structure is that on different runs we may create
212different instances (choose to execute different modules).  You can think of
213the term "method" as denoting the common interface presented by a particular
214set of interchangeable functions, and "object" as denoting a group of related
215methods, or the total shared interface behavior of a group of modules.
216
217
218*** Overall control structure ***
219
220We previously mentioned the need for overall control logic in the compression
221and decompression libraries.  In IJG implementations prior to v5, overall
222control was mostly provided by "pipeline control" modules, which proved to be
223large, unwieldy, and hard to understand.  To improve the situation, the
224control logic has been subdivided into multiple modules.  The control modules
225consist of:
226
2271. Master control for module selection and initialization.  This has two
228responsibilities:
229
230   1A.  Startup initialization at the beginning of image processing.
231        The individual processing modules to be used in this run are selected
232        and given initialization calls.
233
234   1B.  Per-pass control.  This determines how many passes will be performed
235        and calls each active processing module to configure itself
236        appropriately at the beginning of each pass.  End-of-pass processing,
237        where necessary, is also invoked from the master control module.
238
239   Method selection is partially distributed, in that a particular processing
240   module may contain several possible implementations of a particular method,
241   which it will select among when given its initialization call.  The master
242   control code need only be concerned with decisions that affect more than
243   one module.
244
2452. Data buffering control.  A separate control module exists for each
246   inter-processing-step data buffer.  This module is responsible for
247   invoking the processing steps that write or read that data buffer.
248
249Each buffer controller sees the world as follows:
250
251input data => processing step A => buffer => processing step B => output data
252                      |              |               |
253              ------------------ controller ------------------
254
255The controller knows the dataflow requirements of steps A and B: how much data
256they want to accept in one chunk and how much they output in one chunk.  Its
257function is to manage its buffer and call A and B at the proper times.
258
259A data buffer control module may itself be viewed as a processing step by a
260higher-level control module; thus the control modules form a binary tree with
261elementary processing steps at the leaves of the tree.
262
263The control modules are objects.  A considerable amount of flexibility can
264be had by replacing implementations of a control module.  For example:
265* Merging of adjacent steps in the pipeline is done by replacing a control
266  module and its pair of processing-step modules with a single processing-
267  step module.  (Hence the possible merges are determined by the tree of
268  control modules.)
269* In some processing modes, a given interstep buffer need only be a "strip"
270  buffer large enough to accommodate the desired data chunk sizes.  In other
271  modes, a full-image buffer is needed and several passes are required.
272  The control module determines which kind of buffer is used and manipulates
273  virtual array buffers as needed.  One or both processing steps may be
274  unaware of the multi-pass behavior.
275
276In theory, we might be able to make all of the data buffer controllers
277interchangeable and provide just one set of implementations for all.  In
278practice, each one contains considerable special-case processing for its
279particular job.  The buffer controller concept should be regarded as an
280overall system structuring principle, not as a complete description of the
281task performed by any one controller.
282
283
284*** Compression object structure ***
285
286Here is a sketch of the logical structure of the JPEG compression library:
287
288                                                 |-- Colorspace conversion
289                  |-- Preprocessing controller --|
290                  |                              |-- Downsampling
291Main controller --|
292                  |                            |-- Forward DCT, quantize
293                  |-- Coefficient controller --|
294                                               |-- Entropy encoding
295
296This sketch also describes the flow of control (subroutine calls) during
297typical image data processing.  Each of the components shown in the diagram is
298an "object" which may have several different implementations available.  One
299or more source code files contain the actual implementation(s) of each object.
300
301The objects shown above are:
302
303* Main controller: buffer controller for the subsampled-data buffer, which
304  holds the preprocessed input data.  This controller invokes preprocessing to
305  fill the subsampled-data buffer, and JPEG compression to empty it.  There is
306  usually no need for a full-image buffer here; a strip buffer is adequate.
307
308* Preprocessing controller: buffer controller for the downsampling input data
309  buffer, which lies between colorspace conversion and downsampling.  Note
310  that a unified conversion/downsampling module would probably replace this
311  controller entirely.
312
313* Colorspace conversion: converts application image data into the desired
314  JPEG color space; also changes the data from pixel-interleaved layout to
315  separate component planes.  Processes one pixel row at a time.
316
317* Downsampling: performs reduction of chroma components as required.
318  Optionally may perform pixel-level smoothing as well.  Processes a "row
319  group" at a time, where a row group is defined as Vmax pixel rows of each
320  component before downsampling, and Vk sample rows afterwards (remember Vk
321  differs across components).  Some downsampling or smoothing algorithms may
322  require context rows above and below the current row group; the
323  preprocessing controller is responsible for supplying these rows via proper
324  buffering.  The downsampler is responsible for edge expansion at the right
325  edge (i.e., extending each sample row to a multiple of 8 samples); but the
326  preprocessing controller is responsible for vertical edge expansion (i.e.,
327  duplicating the bottom sample row as needed to make a multiple of 8 rows).
328
329* Coefficient controller: buffer controller for the DCT-coefficient data.
330  This controller handles MCU assembly, including insertion of dummy DCT
331  blocks when needed at the right or bottom edge.  When performing
332  Huffman-code optimization or emitting a multiscan JPEG file, this
333  controller is responsible for buffering the full image.  The equivalent of
334  one fully interleaved MCU row of subsampled data is processed per call,
335  even when the JPEG file is noninterleaved.
336
337* Forward DCT and quantization: Perform DCT, quantize, and emit coefficients.
338  Works on one or more DCT blocks at a time.  (Note: the coefficients are now
339  emitted in normal array order, which the entropy encoder is expected to
340  convert to zigzag order as necessary.  Prior versions of the IJG code did
341  the conversion to zigzag order within the quantization step.)
342
343* Entropy encoding: Perform Huffman or arithmetic entropy coding and emit the
344  coded data to the data destination module.  Works on one MCU per call.
345  For progressive JPEG, the same DCT blocks are fed to the entropy coder
346  during each pass, and the coder must emit the appropriate subset of
347  coefficients.
348
349In addition to the above objects, the compression library includes these
350objects:
351
352* Master control: determines the number of passes required, controls overall
353  and per-pass initialization of the other modules.
354
355* Marker writing: generates JPEG markers (except for RSTn, which is emitted
356  by the entropy encoder when needed).
357
358* Data destination manager: writes the output JPEG datastream to its final
359  destination (e.g., a file).  The destination manager supplied with the
360  library knows how to write to a stdio stream or to a memory buffer;
361  for other behaviors, the surrounding application may provide its own
362  destination manager.
363
364* Memory manager: allocates and releases memory, controls virtual arrays
365  (with backing store management, where required).
366
367* Error handler: performs formatting and output of error and trace messages;
368  determines handling of nonfatal errors.  The surrounding application may
369  override some or all of this object's methods to change error handling.
370
371* Progress monitor: supports output of "percent-done" progress reports.
372  This object represents an optional callback to the surrounding application:
373  if wanted, it must be supplied by the application.
374
375The error handler, destination manager, and progress monitor objects are
376defined as separate objects in order to simplify application-specific
377customization of the JPEG library.  A surrounding application may override
378individual methods or supply its own all-new implementation of one of these
379objects.  The object interfaces for these objects are therefore treated as
380part of the application interface of the library, whereas the other objects
381are internal to the library.
382
383The error handler and memory manager are shared by JPEG compression and
384decompression; the progress monitor, if used, may be shared as well.
385
386
387*** Decompression object structure ***
388
389Here is a sketch of the logical structure of the JPEG decompression library:
390
391                                               |-- Entropy decoding
392                  |-- Coefficient controller --|
393                  |                            |-- Dequantize, Inverse DCT
394Main controller --|
395                  |                               |-- Upsampling
396                  |-- Postprocessing controller --|   |-- Colorspace conversion
397                                                  |-- Color quantization
398                                                  |-- Color precision reduction
399
400As before, this diagram also represents typical control flow.  The objects
401shown are:
402
403* Main controller: buffer controller for the subsampled-data buffer, which
404  holds the output of JPEG decompression proper.  This controller's primary
405  task is to feed the postprocessing procedure.  Some upsampling algorithms
406  may require context rows above and below the current row group; when this
407  is true, the main controller is responsible for managing its buffer so as
408  to make context rows available.  In the current design, the main buffer is
409  always a strip buffer; a full-image buffer is never required.
410
411* Coefficient controller: buffer controller for the DCT-coefficient data.
412  This controller handles MCU disassembly, including deletion of any dummy
413  DCT blocks at the right or bottom edge.  When reading a multiscan JPEG
414  file, this controller is responsible for buffering the full image.
415  (Buffering DCT coefficients, rather than samples, is necessary to support
416  progressive JPEG.)  The equivalent of one fully interleaved MCU row of
417  subsampled data is processed per call, even when the source JPEG file is
418  noninterleaved.
419
420* Entropy decoding: Read coded data from the data source module and perform
421  Huffman or arithmetic entropy decoding.  Works on one MCU per call.
422  For progressive JPEG decoding, the coefficient controller supplies the prior
423  coefficients of each MCU (initially all zeroes), which the entropy decoder
424  modifies in each scan.
425
426* Dequantization and inverse DCT: like it says.  Note that the coefficients
427  buffered by the coefficient controller have NOT been dequantized; we
428  merge dequantization and inverse DCT into a single step for speed reasons.
429  When scaled-down output is asked for, simplified DCT algorithms may be used
430  that emit fewer samples per DCT block, not the full 8x8.  Works on one DCT
431  block at a time.
432
433* Postprocessing controller: buffer controller for the color quantization
434  input buffer, when quantization is in use.  (Without quantization, this
435  controller just calls the upsampler.)  For two-pass quantization, this
436  controller is responsible for buffering the full-image data.
437
438* Upsampling: restores chroma components to full size.  (May support more
439  general output rescaling, too.  Note that if undersized DCT outputs have
440  been emitted by the DCT module, this module must adjust so that properly
441  sized outputs are created.)  Works on one row group at a time.  This module
442  also calls the color conversion module, so its top level is effectively a
443  buffer controller for the upsampling->color conversion buffer.  However, in
444  all but the highest-quality operating modes, upsampling and color
445  conversion are likely to be merged into a single step.
446
447* Colorspace conversion: convert from JPEG color space to output color space,
448  and change data layout from separate component planes to pixel-interleaved.
449  Works on one pixel row at a time.
450
451* Color quantization: reduce the data to colormapped form, using either an
452  externally specified colormap or an internally generated one.  This module
453  is not used for full-color output.  Works on one pixel row at a time; may
454  require two passes to generate a color map.  Note that the output will
455  always be a single component representing colormap indexes.  In the current
456  design, the output values are JSAMPLEs, so an 8-bit compilation cannot
457  quantize to more than 256 colors.  This is unlikely to be a problem in
458  practice.
459
460* Color reduction: this module handles color precision reduction, e.g.,
461  generating 15-bit color (5 bits/primary) from JPEG's 24-bit output.
462  Not quite clear yet how this should be handled... should we merge it with
463  colorspace conversion???
464
465Note that some high-speed operating modes might condense the entire
466postprocessing sequence to a single module (upsample, color convert, and
467quantize in one step).
468
469In addition to the above objects, the decompression library includes these
470objects:
471
472* Master control: determines the number of passes required, controls overall
473  and per-pass initialization of the other modules.  This is subdivided into
474  input and output control: jdinput.c controls only input-side processing,
475  while jdmaster.c handles overall initialization and output-side control.
476
477* Marker reading: decodes JPEG markers (except for RSTn).
478
479* Data source manager: supplies the input JPEG datastream.  The source
480  manager supplied with the library knows how to read from a stdio stream
481  or from a memory buffer;  for other behaviors, the surrounding application
482  may provide its own source manager.
483
484* Memory manager: same as for compression library.
485
486* Error handler: same as for compression library.
487
488* Progress monitor: same as for compression library.
489
490As with compression, the data source manager, error handler, and progress
491monitor are candidates for replacement by a surrounding application.
492
493
494*** Decompression input and output separation ***
495
496To support efficient incremental display of progressive JPEG files, the
497decompressor is divided into two sections that can run independently:
498
4991. Data input includes marker parsing, entropy decoding, and input into the
500   coefficient controller's DCT coefficient buffer.  Note that this
501   processing is relatively cheap and fast.
502
5032. Data output reads from the DCT coefficient buffer and performs the IDCT
504   and all postprocessing steps.
505
506For a progressive JPEG file, the data input processing is allowed to get
507arbitrarily far ahead of the data output processing.  (This occurs only
508if the application calls jpeg_consume_input(); otherwise input and output
509run in lockstep, since the input section is called only when the output
510section needs more data.)  In this way the application can avoid making
511extra display passes when data is arriving faster than the display pass
512can run.  Furthermore, it is possible to abort an output pass without
513losing anything, since the coefficient buffer is read-only as far as the
514output section is concerned.  See libjpeg.txt for more detail.
515
516A full-image coefficient array is only created if the JPEG file has multiple
517scans (or if the application specifies buffered-image mode anyway).  When
518reading a single-scan file, the coefficient controller normally creates only
519a one-MCU buffer, so input and output processing must run in lockstep in this
520case.  jpeg_consume_input() is effectively a no-op in this situation.
521
522The main impact of dividing the decompressor in this fashion is that we must
523be very careful with shared variables in the cinfo data structure.  Each
524variable that can change during the course of decompression must be
525classified as belonging to data input or data output, and each section must
526look only at its own variables.  For example, the data output section may not
527depend on any of the variables that describe the current scan in the JPEG
528file, because these may change as the data input section advances into a new
529scan.
530
531The progress monitor is (somewhat arbitrarily) defined to treat input of the
532file as one pass when buffered-image mode is not used, and to ignore data
533input work completely when buffered-image mode is used.  Note that the
534library has no reliable way to predict the number of passes when dealing
535with a progressive JPEG file, nor can it predict the number of output passes
536in buffered-image mode.  So the work estimate is inherently bogus anyway.
537
538No comparable division is currently made in the compression library, because
539there isn't any real need for it.
540
541
542*** Data formats ***
543
544Arrays of pixel sample values use the following data structure:
545
546    typedef something JSAMPLE;          a pixel component value, 0..MAXJSAMPLE
547    typedef JSAMPLE *JSAMPROW;          ptr to a row of samples
548    typedef JSAMPROW *JSAMPARRAY;       ptr to a list of rows
549    typedef JSAMPARRAY *JSAMPIMAGE;     ptr to a list of color-component arrays
550
551The basic element type JSAMPLE will be one of unsigned char or short.  Short
552will be used if samples wider than 8 bits are to be supported (this is a
553compile-time option).  Otherwise, unsigned char is used.
554
555With these conventions, JSAMPLE values can be assumed to be >= 0.  This helps
556simplify correct rounding during downsampling, etc.  The JPEG standard's
557specification that sample values run from -128..127 is accommodated by
558subtracting 128 from the sample value in the DCT step.  Similarly, during
559decompression the output of the IDCT step will be immediately shifted back to
5600..255.  (NB: different values are required when 12-bit samples are in use.
561The code is written in terms of MAXJSAMPLE and CENTERJSAMPLE, which will be
562defined as 255 and 128 respectively in an 8-bit implementation, and as 4095
563and 2048 in a 12-bit implementation.)
564
565We use a pointer per row, rather than a two-dimensional JSAMPLE array.  This
566choice costs only a small amount of memory and has several benefits:
567* Code using the data structure doesn't need to know the allocated width of
568  the rows.  This simplifies edge expansion/compression, since we can work
569  in an array that's wider than the logical picture width.
570* Indexing doesn't require multiplication; this is a performance win on many
571  machines.
572* Arrays with more than 64K total elements can be supported even on machines
573  where malloc() cannot allocate chunks larger than 64K.
574* The rows forming a component array may be allocated at different times
575  without extra copying.  This trick allows some speedups in smoothing steps
576  that need access to the previous and next rows.
577
578Note that each color component is stored in a separate array; we don't use the
579traditional layout in which the components of a pixel are stored together.
580This simplifies coding of modules that work on each component independently,
581because they don't need to know how many components there are.  Furthermore,
582we can read or write each component to a temporary file independently, which
583is helpful when dealing with noninterleaved JPEG files.
584
585In general, a specific sample value is accessed by code such as
586        image[colorcomponent][row][col]
587where col is measured from the image left edge, but row is measured from the
588first sample row currently in memory.  Either of the first two indexings can
589be precomputed by copying the relevant pointer.
590
591
592Since most image-processing applications prefer to work on images in which
593the components of a pixel are stored together, the data passed to or from the
594surrounding application uses the traditional convention: a single pixel is
595represented by N consecutive JSAMPLE values, and an image row is an array of
596(# of color components)*(image width) JSAMPLEs.  One or more rows of data can
597be represented by a pointer of type JSAMPARRAY in this scheme.  This scheme is
598converted to component-wise storage inside the JPEG library.  (Applications
599that want to skip JPEG preprocessing or postprocessing will have to contend
600with component-wise storage.)
601
602
603Arrays of DCT-coefficient values use the following data structure:
604
605    typedef short JCOEF;                a 16-bit signed integer
606    typedef JCOEF JBLOCK[DCTSIZE2];     an 8x8 block of coefficients
607    typedef JBLOCK *JBLOCKROW;          ptr to one horizontal row of 8x8 blocks
608    typedef JBLOCKROW *JBLOCKARRAY;     ptr to a list of such rows
609    typedef JBLOCKARRAY *JBLOCKIMAGE;   ptr to a list of color component arrays
610
611The underlying type is at least a 16-bit signed integer; while "short" is big
612enough on all machines of interest, on some machines it is preferable to use
613"int" for speed reasons, despite the storage cost.  Coefficients are grouped
614into 8x8 blocks (but we always use #defines DCTSIZE and DCTSIZE2 rather than
615"8" and "64").
616
617The contents of a coefficient block may be in either "natural" or zigzagged
618order, and may be true values or divided by the quantization coefficients,
619depending on where the block is in the processing pipeline.  In the current
620library, coefficient blocks are kept in natural order everywhere; the entropy
621codecs zigzag or dezigzag the data as it is written or read.  The blocks
622contain quantized coefficients everywhere outside the DCT/IDCT subsystems.
623(This latter decision may need to be revisited to support variable
624quantization a la JPEG Part 3.)
625
626Notice that the allocation unit is now a row of 8x8 blocks, corresponding to
627eight rows of samples.  Otherwise the structure is much the same as for
628samples, and for the same reasons.
629
630
631*** Suspendable processing ***
632
633In some applications it is desirable to use the JPEG library as an
634incremental, memory-to-memory filter.  In this situation the data source or
635destination may be a limited-size buffer, and we can't rely on being able to
636empty or refill the buffer at arbitrary times.  Instead the application would
637like to have control return from the library at buffer overflow/underrun, and
638then resume compression or decompression at a later time.
639
640This scenario is supported for simple cases.  (For anything more complex, we
641recommend that the application "bite the bullet" and develop real multitasking
642capability.)  The libjpeg.txt file goes into more detail about the usage and
643limitations of this capability; here we address the implications for library
644structure.
645
646The essence of the problem is that the entropy codec (coder or decoder) must
647be prepared to stop at arbitrary times.  In turn, the controllers that call
648the entropy codec must be able to stop before having produced or consumed all
649the data that they normally would handle in one call.  That part is reasonably
650straightforward: we make the controller call interfaces include "progress
651counters" which indicate the number of data chunks successfully processed, and
652we require callers to test the counter rather than just assume all of the data
653was processed.
654
655Rather than trying to restart at an arbitrary point, the current Huffman
656codecs are designed to restart at the beginning of the current MCU after a
657suspension due to buffer overflow/underrun.  At the start of each call, the
658codec's internal state is loaded from permanent storage (in the JPEG object
659structures) into local variables.  On successful completion of the MCU, the
660permanent state is updated.  (This copying is not very expensive, and may even
661lead to *improved* performance if the local variables can be registerized.)
662If a suspension occurs, the codec simply returns without updating the state,
663thus effectively reverting to the start of the MCU.  Note that this implies
664leaving some data unprocessed in the source/destination buffer (ie, the
665compressed partial MCU).  The data source/destination module interfaces are
666specified so as to make this possible.  This also implies that the data buffer
667must be large enough to hold a worst-case compressed MCU; a couple thousand
668bytes should be enough.
669
670In a successive-approximation AC refinement scan, the progressive Huffman
671decoder has to be able to undo assignments of newly nonzero coefficients if it
672suspends before the MCU is complete, since decoding requires distinguishing
673previously-zero and previously-nonzero coefficients.  This is a bit tedious
674but probably won't have much effect on performance.  Other variants of Huffman
675decoding need not worry about this, since they will just store the same values
676again if forced to repeat the MCU.
677
678This approach would probably not work for an arithmetic codec, since its
679modifiable state is quite large and couldn't be copied cheaply.  Instead it
680would have to suspend and resume exactly at the point of the buffer end.
681
682The JPEG marker reader is designed to cope with suspension at an arbitrary
683point.  It does so by backing up to the start of the marker parameter segment,
684so the data buffer must be big enough to hold the largest marker of interest.
685Again, a couple KB should be adequate.  (A special "skip" convention is used
686to bypass COM and APPn markers, so these can be larger than the buffer size
687without causing problems; otherwise a 64K buffer would be needed in the worst
688case.)
689
690The JPEG marker writer currently does *not* cope with suspension.
691We feel that this is not necessary; it is much easier simply to require
692the application to ensure there is enough buffer space before starting.  (An
693empty 2K buffer is more than sufficient for the header markers; and ensuring
694there are a dozen or two bytes available before calling jpeg_finish_compress()
695will suffice for the trailer.)  This would not work for writing multi-scan
696JPEG files, but we simply do not intend to support that capability with
697suspension.
698
699
700*** Memory manager services ***
701
702The JPEG library's memory manager controls allocation and deallocation of
703memory, and it manages large "virtual" data arrays on machines where the
704operating system does not provide virtual memory.  Note that the same
705memory manager serves both compression and decompression operations.
706
707In all cases, allocated objects are tied to a particular compression or
708decompression master record, and they will be released when that master
709record is destroyed.
710
711The memory manager does not provide explicit deallocation of objects.
712Instead, objects are created in "pools" of free storage, and a whole pool
713can be freed at once.  This approach helps prevent storage-leak bugs, and
714it speeds up operations whenever malloc/free are slow (as they often are).
715The pools can be regarded as lifetime identifiers for objects.  Two
716pools/lifetimes are defined:
717  * JPOOL_PERMANENT     lasts until master record is destroyed
718  * JPOOL_IMAGE         lasts until done with image (JPEG datastream)
719Permanent lifetime is used for parameters and tables that should be carried
720across from one datastream to another; this includes all application-visible
721parameters.  Image lifetime is used for everything else.  (A third lifetime,
722JPOOL_PASS = one processing pass, was originally planned.  However it was
723dropped as not being worthwhile.  The actual usage patterns are such that the
724peak memory usage would be about the same anyway; and having per-pass storage
725substantially complicates the virtual memory allocation rules --- see below.)
726
727The memory manager deals with three kinds of object:
7281. "Small" objects.  Typically these require no more than 10K-20K total.
7292. "Large" objects.  These may require tens to hundreds of K depending on
730   image size.  Semantically they behave the same as small objects, but we
731   distinguish them because pool allocation heuristics may differ for large and
732   small objects (historically, large objects were also referenced by far
733   pointers on MS-DOS machines.)  Note that individual "large" objects cannot
734   exceed the size allowed by type size_t, which may be 64K or less on some
735   machines.
7363. "Virtual" objects.  These are large 2-D arrays of JSAMPLEs or JBLOCKs
737   (typically large enough for the entire image being processed).  The
738   memory manager provides stripwise access to these arrays.  On machines
739   without virtual memory, the rest of the array may be swapped out to a
740   temporary file.
741
742(Note: JSAMPARRAY and JBLOCKARRAY data structures are a combination of large
743objects for the data proper and small objects for the row pointers.  For
744convenience and speed, the memory manager provides single routines to create
745these structures.  Similarly, virtual arrays include a small control block
746and a JSAMPARRAY or JBLOCKARRAY working buffer, all created with one call.)
747
748In the present implementation, virtual arrays are only permitted to have image
749lifespan.  (Permanent lifespan would not be reasonable, and pass lifespan is
750not very useful since a virtual array's raison d'etre is to store data for
751multiple passes through the image.)  We also expect that only "small" objects
752will be given permanent lifespan, though this restriction is not required by
753the memory manager.
754
755In a non-virtual-memory machine, some performance benefit can be gained by
756making the in-memory buffers for virtual arrays be as large as possible.
757(For small images, the buffers might fit entirely in memory, so blind
758swapping would be very wasteful.)  The memory manager will adjust the height
759of the buffers to fit within a prespecified maximum memory usage.  In order
760to do this in a reasonably optimal fashion, the manager needs to allocate all
761of the virtual arrays at once.  Therefore, there isn't a one-step allocation
762routine for virtual arrays; instead, there is a "request" routine that simply
763allocates the control block, and a "realize" routine (called just once) that
764determines space allocation and creates all of the actual buffers.  The
765realize routine must allow for space occupied by non-virtual large objects.
766(We don't bother to factor in the space needed for small objects, on the
767grounds that it isn't worth the trouble.)
768
769To support all this, we establish the following protocol for doing business
770with the memory manager:
771  1. Modules must request virtual arrays (which may have only image lifespan)
772     during the initial setup phase, i.e., in their jinit_xxx routines.
773  2. All "large" objects (including JSAMPARRAYs and JBLOCKARRAYs) must also be
774     allocated during initial setup.
775  3. realize_virt_arrays will be called at the completion of initial setup.
776     The above conventions ensure that sufficient information is available
777     for it to choose a good size for virtual array buffers.
778Small objects of any lifespan may be allocated at any time.  We expect that
779the total space used for small objects will be small enough to be negligible
780in the realize_virt_arrays computation.
781
782In a virtual-memory machine, we simply pretend that the available space is
783infinite, thus causing realize_virt_arrays to decide that it can allocate all
784the virtual arrays as full-size in-memory buffers.  The overhead of the
785virtual-array access protocol is very small when no swapping occurs.
786
787A virtual array can be specified to be "pre-zeroed"; when this flag is set,
788never-yet-written sections of the array are set to zero before being made
789available to the caller.  If this flag is not set, never-written sections
790of the array contain garbage.  (This feature exists primarily because the
791equivalent logic would otherwise be needed in jdcoefct.c for progressive
792JPEG mode; we may as well make it available for possible other uses.)
793
794The first write pass on a virtual array is required to occur in top-to-bottom
795order; read passes, as well as any write passes after the first one, may
796access the array in any order.  This restriction exists partly to simplify
797the virtual array control logic, and partly because some file systems may not
798support seeking beyond the current end-of-file in a temporary file.  The main
799implication of this restriction is that rearrangement of rows (such as
800converting top-to-bottom data order to bottom-to-top) must be handled while
801reading data out of the virtual array, not while putting it in.
802
803
804*** Memory manager internal structure ***
805
806To isolate system dependencies as much as possible, we have broken the
807memory manager into two parts.  There is a reasonably system-independent
808"front end" (jmemmgr.c) and a "back end" that contains only the code
809likely to change across systems.  All of the memory management methods
810outlined above are implemented by the front end.  The back end provides
811the following routines for use by the front end (none of these routines
812are known to the rest of the JPEG code):
813
814jpeg_mem_init, jpeg_mem_term    system-dependent initialization/shutdown
815
816jpeg_get_small, jpeg_free_small interface to malloc and free library routines
817                                (or their equivalents)
818
819jpeg_get_large, jpeg_free_large historically was used to interface with
820                                FAR malloc/free on MS-DOS machines;  now the
821                                same as jpeg_get_small/jpeg_free_small
822
823jpeg_mem_available              estimate available memory
824
825jpeg_open_backing_store         create a backing-store object
826
827read_backing_store,             manipulate a backing-store object
828write_backing_store,
829close_backing_store
830
831On some systems there will be more than one type of backing-store object.
832jpeg_open_backing_store is responsible for choosing how to implement a given
833object.  The read/write/close routines are method pointers in the structure
834that describes a given object; this lets them be different for different object
835types.
836
837It may be necessary to ensure that backing store objects are explicitly
838released upon abnormal program termination.  To support this, we will expect
839the main program or surrounding application to arrange to call self_destruct
840(typically via jpeg_destroy) upon abnormal termination.  This may require a
841SIGINT signal handler or equivalent.  We don't want to have the back end module
842install its own signal handler, because that would pre-empt the surrounding
843application's ability to control signal handling.
844
845The IJG distribution includes several memory manager back end implementations.
846Usually the same back end should be suitable for all applications on a given
847system, but it is possible for an application to supply its own back end at
848need.
849
850
851*** Implications of DNL marker ***
852
853Some JPEG files may use a DNL marker to postpone definition of the image
854height (this would be useful for a fax-like scanner's output, for instance).
855In these files the SOF marker claims the image height is 0, and you only
856find out the true image height at the end of the first scan.
857
858We could read these files as follows:
8591. Upon seeing zero image height, replace it by 65535 (the maximum allowed).
8602. When the DNL is found, update the image height in the global image
861   descriptor.
862This implies that control modules must avoid making copies of the image
863height, and must re-test for termination after each MCU row.  This would
864be easy enough to do.
865
866In cases where image-size data structures are allocated, this approach will
867result in very inefficient use of virtual memory or much-larger-than-necessary
868temporary files.  This seems acceptable for something that probably won't be a
869mainstream usage.  People might have to forgo use of memory-hogging options
870(such as two-pass color quantization or noninterleaved JPEG files) if they
871want efficient conversion of such files.  (One could improve efficiency by
872demanding a user-supplied upper bound for the height, less than 65536; in most
873cases it could be much less.)
874
875The standard also permits the SOF marker to overestimate the image height,
876with a DNL to give the true, smaller height at the end of the first scan.
877This would solve the space problems if the overestimate wasn't too great.
878However, it implies that you don't even know whether DNL will be used.
879
880This leads to a couple of very serious objections:
8811. Testing for a DNL marker must occur in the inner loop of the decompressor's
882   Huffman decoder; this implies a speed penalty whether the feature is used
883   or not.
8842. There is no way to hide the last-minute change in image height from an
885   application using the decoder.  Thus *every* application using the IJG
886   library would suffer a complexity penalty whether it cared about DNL or
887   not.
888We currently do not support DNL because of these problems.
889
890A different approach is to insist that DNL-using files be preprocessed by a
891separate program that reads ahead to the DNL, then goes back and fixes the SOF
892marker.  This is a much simpler solution and is probably far more efficient.
893Even if one wants piped input, buffering the first scan of the JPEG file needs
894a lot smaller temp file than is implied by the maximum-height method.  For
895this approach we'd simply treat DNL as a no-op in the decompressor (at most,
896check that it matches the SOF image height).
897
898We will not worry about making the compressor capable of outputting DNL.
899Something similar to the first scheme above could be applied if anyone ever
900wants to make that work.
901