JEP 262: TIFF Image I/O

Summary

Extend the standard set of Image I/O plugins to support the TIFF image format.

Motivation

The Image I/O Framework (javax.imageio), which is part of Java SE, provides a standard way to plug-in image codecs. Codecs for some formats, e.g. PNG and JPEG, must be provided by all implementations. A widely-used format, TIFF, is missing from this set. There have been multiple requests over the years for this format, from developers representing both small and large ISVs. It is also more relevant now since OS X uses TIFF as a standard platform image format and we have been unable to support that to date.

Description

Suitable TIFF reader and writer plugins, written entirely in Java, were previously developed in the Java Advanced Imaging API Tools Project (javadoc). We will merge this into the JDK, alongside the existing Image I/O plugins. The package will be renamed to javax.imageio.plugins.tiff, since it will become a standard part of the Java SE specification. The XML metadata format name will be similarly renamed.

Testing

The code otherwise than package name changes will be incorporated as-is; it has been field tested for many years. We will create jtreg format tests for the APIs that are exposed.