hi,
> REQUIREMENTS:
> 1) ability to generate .gif
> 2) image quality is very important
> 3) controllable image sizes
> 4) controllable font sizes
> 5) ability to generate black matte around text
> 6) Text alignment within image should be controlled
> 7) Helvetica Neue font must be supported
> 8) Transparent background is a bonus
>
> It seems like three major choices are:
>
> (1) Gimp
> (2) libgd (probably, not a candidate anymore as it
> does not produce .gifs due to Unisys licensing)
> (3) ImageMagic
>
> Given my requirements, what would you, kind people,
> recommend?
I'd also look at pbmtext. I have a script which makes image from text, its
mundane and basic, but it does the job I need...you'd have to read the
docs to get your own font in there working (but its easy) . The end result
is a centered font, of your choice (or own making!) in a GIF file with
transparency
heres my little script
cat motd.txt | pbmtext -font font.pbm > motd.pbm
ppmtogif motd.pbm > motdtemp.gif
giftrans -t "#ffffff" motdtemp.gif > motd.gif
converts the message of the day on the main server into a GIF image which
then is displayed on all Linux boxes on their kdm/gdm login window.
alan
