How to save the content of a ID2D1RenderTarget to a file - direct2d

I have an existing component that draws Direct2D content to an ID2D1RenderTarget and I would like to save that drawing to an image file. The questions here, here and here, although they helped me, did not provide a clear answer as how to do it.
My nullth idea was to try the official MSDN method. Unfortunately, it is not available in Win7.
My first idea was to modify the drawing routine to make it accept the RenderTarget as a parameter and use ID2D1Factory::CreateWicBitmapRenderTarget to draw directly into a IWICBitmap, but it turns out to be quite difficult for me (because it would be necessary to modify not only the drawing routine itself, but also the drawing callbacks of all users of that component (the code, written in Delphi, uses Embarcadero's TDirect2DCanvas, and thus did not need to manage all Direct2D resources, like render target or brushes)).
My second idea was to create an ID2D1Bitmap, fill it with what is already drawn using ID2D1Bitmap::CopyFromRenderTarget and then draw that ID2D1Bitmap to a WicBitmapRenderTarget (this is about what was done here). I had the same kind of problems as those who asked the questions I link to: different resources affinities, as briefly explained Kenny Kerr.
So is it possible under Win7 without having to implement my first idea, and how would you do it?

Direct2D 1.1 is supported on Windows 7 if you install the Platform Update. Unfortunately, that doesn't solve your problem without first creating two more of them: 1) it's still pre-release/beta, and 2) it adds another installation dependency for you to worry about.

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What's the closest widget to implement this after-effects feature in Gtk

wisgetwas wondering what widget in gtk (using gtkmm) could be used to implemented the movable button looking thing in the picture. and also the dotted line.
dotted line
edit: the widget is supposed to be able to move left and right along the time-track to be able to set the play bounds. Here is a video showing how it looks like in after effects. From sescond 37 is how the behaviour for it supposed to be. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QxXevteeumg
edit: from what it looks like there isnt a specific widget which could simplify this. However a regular button can be used and then implementing a method for its drage using the various signal handlers associated with a Gtk button
There is no widget that does this (see the widget gallery).
You can, however, add custom widgets using Cairo. In the official Gtkmm book, there is an example for creating a custom clock widget using the Gtk::DrawingArea. The Gtk::DrawingArea offers a lot of signals which you can connect to.
I have created my own widgets in the past using this and it worked just fine. However, it was a lot of work because:
Cairo lacks good documentation. Understanding the philosophy behind this library is a lot of work, often empirical.
It can be hard to acheive acceptable performance using Cairo. One has to be really careful in how the drawing of the widget is performed. There is often a naive way to do it, which is clearer in the code, but devastating in terms of performance (it often involves useless redraws on the CPU).

ESRI ArcGIS Runtime: AttributeLabelClass 10.2.7 ==> 100.0

The 10.2.7 runtime has the class 'AttributeLabelClass' that allows you to format the labels for graphics and add it to a GraphicsLayer such that all Graphics with a certain attribute will render the same way.
Does anyone know if anything like this survived into the 100.0+ timeframe? I've been looking all over for this with no luck (which usually means it's right in front of my nose).
I'm fairly sure something like this exists because I've seen prototype demos of their efforts to resolve label confliction rendering issues.
We're hoping to have this feature back in Update 1. The public API might not be fully complete by then, but you'll at least be able to set everything with the json definition, and a more full-blown API for all the properties by Update 2.

Cropping SVG to range in Inkscape?

Say I have a range – something like a 400x400 rectangle at 60, 60 – which is dynamically generated by a separate program. I'm wondering how it's possible to crop my document to that range in the command line?
Everything I've read has suggested I'd need to add a rectangle to the document, resize the document to that rectangle (resize to selection), and then remove the rectangle.
But I'm having trouble with adding and removing that rectangle. I found the ToolRect verb, but I can't seem to find anything related to actually drawing that rectangle (or removing it).
So, am I doing this wrong or is there just no way to add (and select) the rectangle using only the command line? Using another program is also fine, but I haven't had much luck with that (I couldn't get the python modules installed for the only possibly helpful thing I found..).
In this email discussion from 2012, someone said:
There is no way to pass parameters to verbs (with the current
implementation, they don't take parameters by design).
In case they add this capability later, the required verbs to crop the page would be:
EditSelectAll
SelectionGroup
ToolRect (requires parameters, i.e. where to crop)
EditSelectAll
ObjectSetClipPath
FitCanvasToDrawing
FileVacuum
FileSaveAs (requires a parameter, so that we don't have to overwrite the original)
Since Inkscape can edit any valid SVG, I'd rather look into other available SVG libraries, like this one for Python.
If you are OK with rasterising your image, take a look at this question. Inkscape unfortunately ignores the --export-area option when exporting to svg or pdf.
My – admittedly, unsatisfying – solution was to create a separate program to add a viewbox to the SVG text.
The program I made was implemented into a separate part of my project, so I don't have a good command line version, but if you plan on making one yourself, whatever XML editing library you have for your language of choice should be all you need. I used xmldom for Node.js with relative ease.

Qt, CEGUI or wxWidgets for a text game GUI?

I tried to sign up, but I was unable; perhaps a problem from my side. Hopefully I'll get an answer as anonymous.
I apologize for the grammar/syntax, but English isn't my native language.
Recently I lost my job, so I have enough spare time to try something fun. I decided to create a simple text RPG game for me and some friends. It will very close to the board games like Talisman, Dungeon Run, and HeroQuest, using dice and a simple attribute/skill system. So no 3d graphics. The only 2d element, if I decide to include it, will be a map
that will allow the hero to move between locations. Currently I'm using Windows XP SP3, for the game I use wxDev-C++, and although cross platform would be cool, I don't really care.
I have some experience in C++ (currently using wxDev-C++), but I'm far from being called an expert or even a great programmer. I was about to start writing parts of the code, but I decided to check if creating a GUI for the game is possible. In some forums, many suggested I use Qt, CEGUI or wxWidgets, but most examples I saw are grey boxes that are
indifferent at best, when I want something that fits better in a fantasy setting. I don't claim I would do better, but I want a GUI that is more fantasy related.
What I want from the GUI:
1. A "cool" Gui with decent graphics. I could even create an image to serve as a mask in Photoshop, but the GUI builder will have to support imported images.
2. A relatively large textbox in the middle (with a scrollbar) that will display die rolls, damage and options.
3. The ability to display dynamically values (like the change in the health after each action without requiring to refresh manually)
4. Display an icon or a small image of the character in the area where I display stats/abilities.
5. Open new windows created with tha same GUI builder to allocate points, buy/sell things and open a map.
About the map in the game: I decided to create a map in photoshop. When the hero decides to move to another location, a new window will open showing the map. I thought of 2 possible ways to move between locations: 1) Create hotspots on the image and select one by clicking on the name of the location.(I dare not think about the complexity of this so we
move to idea #2) and 2) Have the image as a backgroung to a grid with vertical and horizontal coordinates. When the hero selects a new area to visit, he clicks on the area, but what he really does is click on the grid, which returns the two values (x,y) of the location and informs the game about the area the hero wants to visit.
Yeah, yeah, I know it's too much, so what I'm most interested in are the 1-3. I know that even if they are possible, it will propably take forever, but as I said I have spare time, and I like learning new things. I apologize for the size of the post, but I decided to post as many info as possible so you know what I want.
If any of you has used Qt, CEGUI or wxWidgets could you tell which covers most of my criteria? I saw some great stuff build with CEGUI, but I don't know if it is too hard to learn?
Thank in advance.
I know my answer comes pretty late, I only recently started using stackoverflow fairly recently, but maybe this response will help anybody.
CEGUI fully supports skinning widgets using XML. Our CEED editor (WYSIWYG) fully supports layout editing, but the skinning editor (LNF editor) is not finished as of now (11.11.2014), the development version supports exchanging images however and changing sizes and proportions, but more advanced adjustments have to be done in XML.
CEGUI has an imageset editor, fully supported by the CEED editor. Creating imagesets (sets of named subimages, with position and dimension inside a big texture atlas) is supported there. Additionally there is a way to create imagesets from just a bunch of jpg/png/... files using a tool. You would have to ask for specifics in the forum though because it is not integrated into CEED yet.
So basically with CEGUI you are free to make whatever fantasy GUI you want. Skinning simple elements like buttons and progress bars isn't much work in XML anyways. Without the finished editor, some more advanced widgets are more work to skin, but many skins have already been created done this way and some of them are even publically available in the forum and in the CEGUI stock files.
StaticText widgets supports what you want, you can even use images in there or change fonts and colours in the text if you want. Scrollbars are supported too.
I am not sure what you mean by this. You have to specify this.
A simple "Generic/Image" widget is available in CEGUI for this purpose. You can use precreated images or even RTT textures.
You can create and destroy windows in CEGUI without issues.
Regarding the map: I m not sure what you mean, but getting the position of a click in respect to an image (representing the map) is possible in CEGUI.
CEGUI is not particularly hard to learn. There is always the forums and the chat if you got questions. For an Open Source project it is quite well documented so if you read all of the API docu, and look at the supplied samples in the sample browser, you should already get quite far. And for everything additional there is the forum (search), the IRC chat and a community wiki (mind the targeted versions of an article there though)
For a project like yours, CEGUI seems perfectly suited (this is what it was created for in the first place). Qt is not really optimal for games for numerous reasons. wxWidgets I have never used.

Android Activity.setContentView(), smooth transition?

I'm developing my first Android game and I'm having a bit of difficulty making the UI as smooth as I would like. I've spent a couple of hours googling around with no luck, I'm probably just searching for the wrong thing.
I have two different XML layout resources where each layout contains just one SurfaceView subclass. When I call activity.setContentView(R.layout.second_layout) to transition from the first layout to the second layout there is a noticeable period of time where a black screen (with a small white bar along the top) is displayed in between the two views.
I've tried various things such as; constructing the second view manually at runtime (i.e not using a layout XML file), calling activity.overridePendingTransition(android.R.anim.fade_in, android.R.anim.fade_out) after activity.setContentView(R.layout.second_layout) and attempting to render to the canvas before the view has loaded (turns out the canvas is unavailable).
I don't see other games (or apps) having this issue so I presume there is a reasonably simple solution.
If you need some more information about my particular situation in order to help out then please let me know what information is missing. Any help would be largely appreciated.
Update: My answer below was written in 2010. Since then Fragments have become the norm, particularly since Fragment nesting was made possible and the support library allows this functionality to be used in a backwards compatible fashion. As such, instead of transitioning to a new Activity to perform a new "user task", you can use the one Activity and push and pop fragments within that Activity's view hierarchy. Animations can also be performed as a part of a fragment transaction (e.g. Fragment transaction animation: slide in and slide out).
This became pretty apparent not long after posting this question, however I thought I should come back here and make it clear to everyone else.
Activities are positively the way to go when developing for Android. Don't be put off by the fact that a transition may seem too minor for a separate Activity, the very foundation of Android is built around the idea of an Activity.

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