Slight angle and positioning errors of text labels on FreeBSD Mapserver 3.7

[jlowe@…]

There is a difference in label angles and placement between mapserver-3.6.3 and
mapserver-3.7 (from 1/16/03 nightly build). Specifically, when labeling lines
with the "ANGLE AUTO" parameter, mapserver-3.6.3 (w/ freetype-1.3.1 and
gd-1.8.4) places line labels exactly along and on top of the lines.
Mapserver-3.7 (w/ freetype-2.1.3 and gd-2.x) places the labels (sometimes)
slightly different from the angle of the lines and slightly askew from the
lines. Comparisons appear at the following (temporary)
URL: http://www.giswebsite.com/labels/  The labels generated by mapserver-3.6.3
look cleaner cartographically.

[bfraser@…]

Same problem on Windows.  I'm trying to get rotated symbols for a point layer.  
Since rotated symbols are not supported in Mapserver, I'm using the work-around 
of using an annotation layer with rotated labels (of a single character).  The 
rotation seems good, but the position is too far south by about a character 
height (when the rotation is 55 degrees). Now that I think about the rotation, 
it's not what I expected. My rotation value represents a heading (0=north, cw), 
but I suppose the rotation value should be ccw from the X-axis?

Can I get this bumped to at least Normal severity?

[sdlime]

Version 3.7/4.0 will not support GD 1.x nor Freetype 1.x any more. Luckily I
believe this issue has been fixed with changes in GD and Freetype. Use the
latest versions of each and all should be well.

Steve