A Decade of Slug

332 points by mwkaufma 4 hours ago

https://web.archive.org/web/20260317185928/https://terathon....

This is wonderful news, and my sincere thanks to the author. I remember coming upon this algorithm several years ago, and thinking it was extremely elegant and very appealing, but being disappointed by the patent status making it unusable for FOSS work. I really appreciate the author's choice to dedicate it to the public domain after a reasonable amount of time, and congratulations on the success it had while proprietary!

Now if I ever get around to writing that terminal emulator for fun, I'll be tempted to do it with this algorithm for the code's aesthetic appeal.

olejorgenb - 2 hours ago

> I was granted a patent for the Slug algorithm in 2019, and I legally have exclusive rights to it until the year 2038. But I think that’s too long. The patent has already served its purpose well, and I believe that holding on to it any longer benefits nobody. Therefore, effective today, I am permanently and irrevocably dedicating the Slug patent to the public domain.
- convexhulled - an hour ago
  
  Yes, now that SDF font rendering is the industry's preference, he drops the software patent. That is, he is dropping the patent because it isn't a commercially viable piece of software, not because he is ethically opposed to it. Great virtue signaling though.
  - dwroberts - an hour ago
    
    Seems more like he had the patent long enough to build a sustainable business from his own work, and now he’s been able to earn enough from it that others’ implementations aren’t a risk to him.
    Which is kind of the entire point of patents, just that they last way too long relative to the speed of technological progress
  - skullt - an hour ago
    
    SDF font rendering has been around 20+ years though? Valve really popularized in their 2007 SIGGRAPH paper and Chlumský developed MSDF font rendering in a 2015 thesis.
  - ZeWaka - an hour ago
    
    You do realize he could've just kept it until 2038, right? This was completely unforced.
actionfromafar - 3 hours ago

Software patents valid for 8 years is actually something I could get behind.

cachius - 2 hours ago

His latest project is https://radicalpie.com/

A Professional Equation Editor for Windows 10/11 for 60$ that uses Slug for rendering. Presumably he‘s using it to write his great FGED books.

astroalex - an hour ago

I used Slug at a previous job. It is an excellent, artfully crafted library; really the pinnacle of software engineering in my opinion. Thanks to the author for donating the algorithm to the public domain!

byearthithatius - 3 hours ago

Love it when someone who makes complex, helpful software is rewarded for their efforts. More stories like this!

VikingCoder - 3 hours ago

Is it on ShaderToy yet? :D

Cthulhu_ - 2 hours ago

Damn, I worked with the author's game engine (C4) about... 20 years ago now while still in school, didn't know they were still active in that area!

lacoolj - an hour ago

> But I think that’s too long. The patent has already served its purpose well, and I believe that holding on to it any longer benefits nobody.

Damn dude didn't you pay like ... over $10k for that patent?

elengyel - an hour ago

I took care of the whole thing myself without lawyers, so I ended up paying something like $950 in various filing fees.
- kzrdude - 30 minutes ago
  
  How did you get that diploma/plaque, is that something every patent author will have?

Vipitis - 2 hours ago

I am sorta in a position where implementing a glyph renderer as a compute shader would be helpful. This is a great opportunity to use this as a reference... exciting weekend project!

adamrezich - 19 minutes ago

Finally, some good video game development news!

swiftcoder - 2 hours ago

Lengyel continues to be standup dude, kudos!

leecommamichael - an hour ago

Thank you!

maximilianburke - 2 hours ago

Amazing! Thank you, Eric!

forrestthewoods - 3 hours ago

Oh wow this is crazy. This was a project that was reasonably successful commercially. And now it’s just being given away open source? What an absolutely incredibly gift to the community!!

aseipp - 2 hours ago

Not quite, just the pixel/vertex shaders and the algorithm is public domain. Slug "the software package" is not open source (you can get a copy of it along with C4 Engine for $100 to take a peek if you want, though).

moralestapia - 3 hours ago

Thank you for your service!

rrauenza - 3 hours ago

Here's an alternate if you're also getting connection reset errors:

https://web.archive.org/web/20260317185928/https://terathon....

dang - 3 hours ago

We'll put that link in the toptext as well. Thanks!