[whatwg] Proposal: ImageData constructor or factory method with preexisting data

[Ian Hickson]

On Mon, 12 Aug 2013, Kenneth Russell wrote:
> 
> The use case is the passing of ImageData objects back and forth to 
> workers to fill and refill with data.
> 
> An ImageData is essentially a wrapper for the underlying 
> Uint8ClampedArray, providing an associated width and height. However, 
> the only way to draw raw pixels into a Canvas is using an ImageData.
> 
> Currently a Unit8ClampedArray can be constructed, but the only way to 
> create an ImageData is to ask a Canvas for one, and there's no way to 
> associate it with a pre-allocated Uint8ClampedArray.

Why can't you just send an ImageData over?


> This means that if you want to pass an ImageData to a worker for 
> filling, transferring the underlying Uint8ClampedArray, you need to be 
> very careful about bookkeeping, and to not lose the reference to the 
> ImageData object.

Sure. Just send the ImageData over. That seems relatively 
straight-forward. What am I missing?


> IMO there ought to be a factory method for ImageData taking a 
> Uint8ClampedArray, width, height, and possibly resolution (or a 
> dictionary?), which validates the width, height and resolution against 
> the size of the Uint8ClampedArray, and makes a new ImageData object. 
> This would ease management of ImageData instances.

We could have a constructor for ImageData objects, sure. That would be 
relatively easy to add, if it's really needed. I don't understand why it's 
hard to keep track of ImageData objects, though. Can you elaborate?

-- 
Ian Hickson               U+1047E                )\._.,--....,'``.    fL
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