Hello

In the OS/2 port of Squeak, I used a game-oriented API (DIVE) for
transferring the pixels to the display. It uses hardware acceleration to
transfer from a buffer that is allocated in video ram (if possible). So,
the Squeak VM allocates one of such intermediate buffers, and transfer the
pixels to it, doing the bit-endian conversion. This should be as optimized
as posible. The pixels are then copied from the intermediate buffer to the
actual display memory by the video card acceleration hardware, almost
instantly.

So, only one bit reversal is necessary. The results are quite satisfactory.
The problem is that if you don't have enought video memory for the
intermediate buffer, it is allocated from main memory, using it up, and
slowing the display update.

If you have such a game-oriented display routine for BeOS, give it a try.

Juan Manuel Vuletich
SW Export  IGS- IBM Argentina
Phone Nbr : 54-1-313-0014 ext. 5207
Tie Line : 840-5207
e-mail: vuletich at ar.ibm.com