Build color palette using median cut instead of naive method

Terminal.Gui/Drawing/ColorQuantizer.cs

@@ -15,38 +15,24 @@ public class ColorQuantizer
         Palette = new List<Color> ();
     }
 
-    public void BuildColorPalette (Color [,] pixels)
+    public void BuildPalette (Color [,] pixels, IPaletteBuilder builder)
     {
+        List<Color> allColors = new List<Color> ();
         int width = pixels.GetLength (0);
         int height = pixels.GetLength (1);
 
-        // Count the frequency of each color
         for (int x = 0; x < width; x++)
         {
             for (int y = 0; y < height; y++)
             {
-                Color color = pixels [x, y];
-                if (colorFrequency.ContainsKey (color))
-                {
-                    colorFrequency [color]++;
-                }
-                else
-                {
-                    colorFrequency [color] = 1;
-                }
+                allColors.Add (pixels [x, y]);
             }
         }
 
-        // Create a sorted list of colors based on frequency
-        var sortedColors = colorFrequency.OrderByDescending (kvp => kvp.Value).ToList ();
-
-        // Build the Palette with the most frequent colors up to MaxColors
-        Palette = sortedColors.Take (MaxColors).Select (kvp => kvp.Key).ToList ();
-
-
+        Palette = builder.BuildPalette(allColors,MaxColors);
     }
 
-    public int GetNearestColor (Color toTranslate)
+    public int GetNearestColor (Color toTranslate, IColorDistance distanceAlgorithm)
     {
         // Simple nearest color matching based on Euclidean distance in RGB space
         double minDistance = double.MaxValue;
@@ -55,7 +41,7 @@ public class ColorQuantizer
         for (var index = 0; index < Palette.Count; index++)
         {
             Color color = Palette [index];
-            double distance = ColorDistance (color, toTranslate);
+            double distance = distanceAlgorithm.CalculateDistance(color, toTranslate);
 
             if (distance < minDistance)
             {
@@ -66,13 +52,202 @@ public class ColorQuantizer
 
         return nearestIndex;
     }
+}
+
+public interface IPaletteBuilder
+{
+    List<Color> BuildPalette (List<Color> colors, int maxColors);
+}
 
-    private double ColorDistance (Color c1, Color c2)
+/// <summary>
+/// Interface for algorithms that compute the relative distance between pairs of colors.
+/// This is used for color matching to a limited palette, such as in Sixel rendering.
+/// </summary>
+public interface IColorDistance
+{
+    /// <summary>
+    /// Computes a similarity metric between two <see cref="Color"/> instances.
+    /// A larger value indicates more dissimilar colors, while a smaller value indicates more similar colors.
+    /// The metric is internally consistent for the given algorithm.
+    /// </summary>
+    /// <param name="c1">The first color.</param>
+    /// <param name="c2">The second color.</param>
+    /// <returns>A numeric value representing the distance between the two colors.</returns>
+    double CalculateDistance (Color c1, Color c2);
+}
+
+/// <summary>
+/// Calculates the distance between two colors using Euclidean distance in 3D RGB space.
+/// This measures the straight-line distance between the two points representing the colors.
+/// </summary>
+public class EuclideanColorDistance : IColorDistance
+{
+    public double CalculateDistance (Color c1, Color c2)
     {
-        // Euclidean distance in RGB space
         int rDiff = c1.R - c2.R;
         int gDiff = c1.G - c2.G;
         int bDiff = c1.B - c2.B;
         return Math.Sqrt (rDiff * rDiff + gDiff * gDiff + bDiff * bDiff);
     }
+}
+
+
+class MedianCutPaletteBuilder : IPaletteBuilder
+{
+    public List<Color> BuildPalette (List<Color> colors, int maxColors)
+    {
+        // Initial step: place all colors in one large box
+        List<ColorBox> boxes = new List<ColorBox> { new ColorBox (colors) };
+
+        // Keep splitting boxes until we have the desired number of colors
+        while (boxes.Count < maxColors)
+        {
+            // Find the box with the largest range and split it
+            ColorBox boxToSplit = FindBoxWithLargestRange (boxes);
+
+            if (boxToSplit == null || boxToSplit.Colors.Count == 0)
+            {
+                break;
+            }
+
+            // Split the box into two smaller boxes
+            var splitBoxes = SplitBox (boxToSplit);
+            boxes.Remove (boxToSplit);
+            boxes.AddRange (splitBoxes);
+        }
+
+        // Average the colors in each box to get the final palette
+        return boxes.Select (box => box.GetAverageColor ()).ToList ();
+    }
+
+    // Find the box with the largest color range (R, G, or B)
+    private ColorBox FindBoxWithLargestRange (List<ColorBox> boxes)
+    {
+        ColorBox largestRangeBox = null;
+        int largestRange = 0;
+
+        foreach (var box in boxes)
+        {
+            int range = box.GetColorRange ();
+            if (range > largestRange)
+            {
+                largestRange = range;
+                largestRangeBox = box;
+            }
+        }
+
+        return largestRangeBox;
+    }
+
+    // Split a box at the median point in its largest color channel
+    private List<ColorBox> SplitBox (ColorBox box)
+    {
+        List<ColorBox> result = new List<ColorBox> ();
+
+        // Find the color channel with the largest range (R, G, or B)
+        int channel = box.GetLargestChannel ();
+        var sortedColors = box.Colors.OrderBy (c => GetColorChannelValue (c, channel)).ToList ();
+
+        // Split the box at the median
+        int medianIndex = sortedColors.Count / 2;
+
+        var lowerHalf = sortedColors.Take (medianIndex).ToList ();
+        var upperHalf = sortedColors.Skip (medianIndex).ToList ();
+
+        result.Add (new ColorBox (lowerHalf));
+        result.Add (new ColorBox (upperHalf));
+
+        return result;
+    }
+
+    // Helper method to get the value of a color channel (R = 0, G = 1, B = 2)
+    private static int GetColorChannelValue (Color color, int channel)
+    {
+        switch (channel)
+        {
+            case 0: return color.R;
+            case 1: return color.G;
+            case 2: return color.B;
+            default: throw new ArgumentException ("Invalid channel index");
+        }
+    }
+
+    // The ColorBox class to represent a subset of colors
+    public class ColorBox
+    {
+        public List<Color> Colors { get; private set; }
+
+        public ColorBox (List<Color> colors)
+        {
+            Colors = colors;
+        }
+
+        // Get the color channel with the largest range (0 = R, 1 = G, 2 = B)
+        public int GetLargestChannel ()
+        {
+            int rRange = GetColorRangeForChannel (0);
+            int gRange = GetColorRangeForChannel (1);
+            int bRange = GetColorRangeForChannel (2);
+
+            if (rRange >= gRange && rRange >= bRange)
+            {
+                return 0;
+            }
+
+            if (gRange >= rRange && gRange >= bRange)
+            {
+                return 1;
+            }
+
+            return 2;
+        }
+
+        // Get the range of colors for a given channel (0 = R, 1 = G, 2 = B)
+        private int GetColorRangeForChannel (int channel)
+        {
+            int min = int.MaxValue, max = int.MinValue;
+
+            foreach (var color in Colors)
+            {
+                int value = GetColorChannelValue (color, channel);
+                if (value < min)
+                {
+                    min = value;
+                }
+
+                if (value > max)
+                {
+                    max = value;
+                }
+            }
+
+            return max - min;
+        }
+
+        // Get the overall color range across all channels (for finding the box to split)
+        public int GetColorRange ()
+        {
+            int rRange = GetColorRangeForChannel (0);
+            int gRange = GetColorRangeForChannel (1);
+            int bRange = GetColorRangeForChannel (2);
+
+            return Math.Max (rRange, Math.Max (gRange, bRange));
+        }
+
+        // Calculate the average color in the box
+        public Color GetAverageColor ()
+        {
+            int totalR = 0, totalG = 0, totalB = 0;
+
+            foreach (var color in Colors)
+            {
+                totalR += color.R;
+                totalG += color.G;
+                totalB += color.B;
+            }
+
+            int count = Colors.Count;
+            return new Color (totalR / count, totalG / count, totalB / count);
+        }
+    }
 }

Terminal.Gui/Drawing/SixelEncoder.cs

@@ -162,7 +162,7 @@ public class SixelEncoder
     private string GetColorPallette (Color [,] pixels, out ColorQuantizer quantizer)
     {
         quantizer = new ColorQuantizer ();
-        quantizer.BuildColorPalette (pixels);
+        quantizer.BuildPaletteUsingMedianCut (pixels);
 
 
         // Color definitions in the format "#<index>;<type>;<R>;<G>;<B>" - For type the 2 means RGB.  The values range 0 to 100