Legacy ImageMagick Discussions Archive

Is it possible to build the ImageMagick without any external dependencies whatsoever and still be able to read/write .png, .bmp, .jpeg, etc? If so, what are the options I should pass to the configure script? Thanks so much!

and PNG and JPG use external librarys...

Essentually NO, but it is a little more complex than that.

IM does not want to re-implement what is generally already available on basically all computer systems, and implemented fully. otherwise developers are essentially making its own 'wheel' all over again.

IM can be compile or even be installed (and run) without those libraries (even if compiled to use those libraries), but it will not be able to use those common formats until the libraries are installed (perhaps later). The same thing happens with ghostscript (for postscript/PDF formats) which is far less common.

But these formats are so commonly used, that package manager systems (like RPM) generally regard them as dependencies, even so they are not truly dependants unless you really do want to use those formats. Most users would otherwise complaint that IM is broken, when IM itself isn't, just unable to use those formats while the libraries are missing.

This 'optional dependency' is a core feature of IM, but something few other programs (and package managers) understand.