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LDP/howto/docbook/Font-HOWTO/Font-HOWTO.xml
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@ -1,5 +1,6 @@
<?xml version = '1.0' encoding = 'UTF-8'?>
<!DOCTYPE article PUBLIC "-//OASIS//DTD DocBook XML V4.2//EN" "http://www.oasis-open.org/docbook/xml/4.2/docbookx.dtd">
<?xml-stylesheet type = 'text/xsl' href = 'file:///usr/share/sgml/docbook/xsl-stylesheets/xhtml/docbook.xsl' ?>
<article version="1.0">
<articleinfo>
<title>Optimal Use of Fonts on Linux</title>
@ -9,7 +10,7 @@
<holder>Donovan Rebbechi</holder>
<holder>Hal Burgiss</holder>
</copyright>
<pubdate>2006-07-02</pubdate>
<pubdate>2007-02-08</pubdate>
<authorgroup>
<author>
<firstname>Avi</firstname>
@ -33,6 +34,12 @@
</author>
</authorgroup>
<revhistory>
<revision>
<revnumber>2007-02-08</revnumber>
<date>08 Feb 2007</date>
<authorinitials>avi</authorinitials>
<revremark>Fixed some typos, updated Luc's page URL, added DejaVu sections, added link to FC6 Freetype RPMs, added link to Debian MS Core fonts, and added reference to the gnome-font-properties command.</revremark>
</revision>
<revision>
<revnumber>2006-07-02</revnumber>
<date>02 Jul 2006</date>
@ -148,7 +155,7 @@
<title>Introduction</title>
<para>You can have the coolest desktop widget theme, the most enlightened colors combination, and a very nice background wallpaper. Your desktop still won't look professional, clean, beautiful, and most important, comfortable, without good fonts.</para>
<para>It is a common sense nowadays that good fonts are a key element for good desktop usability, because we use to spend hours per day in front of computers, writing documents, dealing with huge spreadsheets, making presentations, browsing and chatting. So we are all the day reading text.</para>
<para>The font subsystem on Linux evolved a lot in the last years, from an old naming, handling and option of fonts, to the support of True Type, Bistream Vera, etc. As of release time of Fedora Core 2, components like <ulink url="http://www.keithp.com/~keithp/render/" >Xft</ulink>, <ulink url="http://www.freetype.org" >FreeType</ulink> and <ulink url="http://www.fontconfig.org" >FontConfig</ulink>, and higher level software usage of them has stabilized and is now considered mature. But Linux still has issues with optimal font rendering, most of them related to software patents that we describe in <xref linkend="notgood" /> bellow.</para>
<para>The font subsystem on Linux evolved a lot in the last years, from an old naming, handling and option of fonts, to the support of True Type, Bistream Vera, etc. As of release time of Fedora Core 2, components like <ulink url="http://www.keithp.com/~keithp/render/" >Xft</ulink>, <ulink url="http://www.freetype.org" >FreeType</ulink> and <ulink url="http://www.fontconfig.org" >FontConfig</ulink>, and higher level software usage of them has stabilized and is now considered mature. But Linux still has issues with optimal font rendering, most of them related to software patents that we describe in <xref linkend="notgood" /> below.</para>
</section>
<section id="notgood" >
<title>Why Fonts on Linux Aren't Straight Forward ?</title>
@ -221,7 +228,7 @@
<para>Install the <link linkend="msfonts" >Webcore Fonts package (a.k.a. Microsoft fonts)</link>.</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>Follow the instructions bellow on <link linkend="desktop" >how to configure your desktop and common applications</link>.</para>
<para>Follow the instructions below on <link linkend="desktop" >how to configure your desktop and common applications</link>.</para>
</listitem>
</orderedlist>
<section id="freetype" >
@ -230,11 +237,13 @@
<para>FreeType compiled with BCI presented much better screen font rendering results.</para>
<para>Get <acronym>RPM</acronym>s for your distribution here:</para>
<itemizedlist>
<listitem>
<para><ulink url="http://avi.alkalay.net/software/freetype.bci/FC3-FC4-RHEL3-RHEL4/">CentoOS or Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3 and 4, and Fedora 3 and 4 <acronym>RPM</acronym>s</ulink>.</para>
<listitem><para><ulink url="http://avi.alkalay.net/software/freetype.bci/FC6/">Fedora 6 <acronym>RPM</acronym>s</ulink>.</para>
</listitem>
<listitem><para><ulink url="http://avi.alkalay.net/software/freetype.bci/FC5/">Fedora 5 <acronym>RPM</acronym>s</ulink> by Cody DeHaan.</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para><ulink url="http://avi.alkalay.net/software/freetype.bci/FC3-FC4-RHEL3-RHEL4/">CentoOS or Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3 and 4, and Fedora 3 and 4 <acronym>RPM</acronym>s</ulink>.</para>
</listitem>
<listitem><para><ulink url="http://plf.zarb.org/" >Mandrake <acronym>RPM</acronym>s</ulink> through the Penguin Liberation Front website. The package name is <emphasis>libfreetype6</emphasis>.</para>
</listitem>
<listitem><para>Debian Sarge users have the BCI enabled FreeType from the "testing" and "unstable" package repositories. Next stable Debian version will include it as their default. The Debian package name is <emphasis>libfreetype6</emphasis>.</para>
@ -247,8 +256,8 @@
<section id="desktop" >
<title>Configure Your Desktop</title>
<bridgehead renderas="sect4" >General Guidelines</bridgehead>
<para>The main idea is to use good hinted fonts all around. As a general rule, we'll use <emphasis>Tahoma 8pt</emphasis> for desktop widgets, <emphasis>LucidaTypewriter 8pt</emphasis> for monospace text, and <emphasis>Verdana 8pt, 9pt or 10pt</emphasis> for fluent text reading or web surfing. These are the default font sizes on a Microsoft Windows desktop, and they look good on a 1024x768 screen. If you have a better screen resolution (1280x1024, 1600x1200) our suggestion is to stick with this fonts but increase their sizes.</para>
<para>We choose these fonts, specially <link linkend="msfonts">Microsoft's <emphasis>Tahoma</emphasis> and <emphasis>Verdana</emphasis></link>, because they look perfect at small sizes (8pt, due to their excellent hinting), providing a more efficient screen utilization. They'll make your desktop look beautiful, professional, clean and comfortable. These fonts were designed for this purposes.</para>
<para>The main idea is to use good hinted fonts all around. As a general rule, we'll use <emphasis>Tahoma 8pt</emphasis> for desktop widgets, <emphasis>LucidaTypewriter 8pt</emphasis> for monospace text, and <emphasis>Verdana 8pt, 9pt or 10pt</emphasis> for fluent text reading or web surfing. These are the default font sizes on a Microsoft Windows desktop, and they look good on a 1024x768 screen. If you have a better screen resolution (1280x1024, 1600x1200) our suggestion is to stick with these fonts but increase their sizes.</para>
<para>We choose these fonts, specially <link linkend="msfonts">Microsoft's <emphasis>Tahoma</emphasis> and <emphasis>Verdana</emphasis></link>, because they look perfect at small sizes (8pt, due to their excellent hinting), providing a more efficient screen utilization. They'll make your desktop look beautiful, professional, clean and comfortable. These fonts were designed for this purpose.</para>
<para>For window titles or text that will appear in bigger sizes, you may choose whatever you want because bigger sizes hinting are not so relevant.</para>
<section id="antialiasing" >
<title>A Note About Anti-Aliasing</title>
@ -262,7 +271,7 @@
<title>General KDE font configuration</title>
<graphic fileref="kde.png" srccredit="Avi Alkalay, 2004" />
</figure>
<para>So we basically choosed <emphasis>Trebuchet 12pt</emphasis> as the window title font, the bitmap font <emphasis>LucidaTypewriter 8pt</emphasis> for fixed size text, and <emphasis>Tahoma 8pt</emphasis> for everything else, which includes menus, buttons, etc. The 2 first should follow your taste, but <emphasis>Tahoma 8pt</emphasis> for all the rest is the optimal configuration, also used by MS Windows 2000 and XP.</para>
<para>So we basically chose <emphasis>Trebuchet 12pt</emphasis> as the window title font, the bitmap font <emphasis>LucidaTypewriter 8pt</emphasis> for fixed size text, and <emphasis>Tahoma 8pt</emphasis> for everything else, which includes menus, buttons, etc. The 2 first should follow your taste, but <emphasis>Tahoma 8pt</emphasis> for all the rest is the optimal configuration, also used by MS Windows 2000 and XP.</para>
<para>One other thing to note is that I disabled anti-aliasing for font sizes up to 9 points. Look at the entire dialog and see how all text is clearly rendered, looks clean precise and professional.</para>
<para>Konqueror (KDE's browser and file manager) also needs font configuration for beautiful web browsing and file management. </para>
<figure>
@ -281,7 +290,7 @@
</section>
<section id="gnome" >
<title>Gnome</title>
<para>We'll use our generic rules here too: <emphasis>Tahoma 8pt</emphasis> for everything.</para>
<para>We'll use our generic rules here too: <emphasis>Tahoma 8pt</emphasis> for everything. Navigate preferences menu to invoke the following dialog or just run <command>gnome-font-properties</command> from the command line.</para>
<figure>
<title>Gnome Font Configurations</title>
<graphic fileref="gnome.png" srccredit="Avi Alkalay, 2004" />
@ -348,6 +357,14 @@
<para>
<emphasis>Bitstream Vera</emphasis> fonts are included by default in all modern Linux distributions.</para>
</section>
<section id="dejavu" >
<title>DejaVu Fonts</title>
<para>The <ulink url="http://dejavu.sourceforge.net/">DejaVu fonts</ulink> are modifications of the Bitstream Vera fonts designed to extend this original for greater coverage of Unicode. It is being included by default in all modern Linux distributions, and everywhere you were thinking to use Bitstream Vera, DejaVu is another option with a more complete Unicode set.</para>
<figure>
<title>The DejaVu Fonts</title>
<graphic fileref="http://dejavu.sourceforge.net/wiki/images/1/14/Dejavu.png" srccredit="Wikimedia" />
</figure>
</section>
<section id="msfonts" >
<title>Webcore Fonts</title>
<para>The <ulink url="http://avi.alkalay.net/software/webcore-fonts">official distribution of these fonts for Linux</ulink> include tarballs and RPMs for several distributions.</para>
@ -357,7 +374,7 @@
<title>The Webcore Fonts</title>
<graphic fileref="msfonts.png" srccredit="Avi Alkalay, 2004" />
</figure>
<para>As we said before, <emphasis>Tahoma</emphasis> and <emphasis>Verdana</emphasis> were designed for the screen, but they are getting overused for many other purposes.</para>
<para>As we said before, <emphasis>Tahoma</emphasis> and <emphasis>Verdana</emphasis> were designed for the screen, but they are getting overused for many other purpose.</para>
<para>Our objective here is to provide links where you can get good quality <acronym>RPM</acronym>s, debs, etc for your distribution. These packages are provided by independent contributors, so if you have the skills to build them for your distribution, please <ulink url="mailto:avi at unix DOT sh" >contact us</ulink> and send the URL for your packages. WE WILL ACCEPT CONTRIBUTIONS.</para>
<para>Packages for distributions:</para>
<itemizedlist>
@ -370,12 +387,15 @@
<ulink url="http://rpm.borgnet.us/10.1/" >Mandrake signed</ulink>
<ulink url="http://rpm.borgnet.us/10.1/media/RPMS/noarch/" >RPMs</ulink> by <ulink url="mailto:sgrayban AT borgnet DOT us" >Borgnet (Scott Grayban)</ulink>.</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>Debian Sarge (currently stable) and Etch (soon to be stable) both contain a package called <ulink url="http://packages.debian.org/stable/x11/msttcorefonts">msttcorefonts</ulink> which contains the MS core fonts. Most Debian users running a GUI will probably install it.</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>Please send us more, such as Slackware and Debian packages.</para>
</listitem>
</itemizedlist>
<para>After installing this font package you'll also note a better rendering of web pages, because professional web designers use to use them for their pages.</para>
<para>Some people say these fonts are free only for who have a Microsoft Windows license.</para>
<para>Some people say these fonts are free only for persons who have a Microsoft Windows license.</para>
</section>
<!--section id="otherfonts"><title>Other and Old Fonts</title>
<para></para>
@ -436,7 +456,7 @@
</tgroup>
</table>
<para>Using these fonts you'll be able to safely exchange and print documents between different modern Linux distributions.</para>
<para>There are other fonts available on your Linux system, but we not listed them here because they are low-quality (obsolete) bitmap fonts, to be used on the screen, and not for documents.</para>
<para>There are other fonts available on your Linux system, but we did not list them here because they are low-quality (obsolete) bitmap fonts, to be used on the screen, and not for documents.</para>
</section>
<section id="doca2a" >
<title>Any to Any with OpenOffice.org and Bitstream Vera Fonts</title>
@ -662,12 +682,12 @@ myfonts/myfonts/font3.ttf
<title>Classifications of Typefaces</title>
<section>
<title>Fixed versus variable width</title>
<para>There are several classifications of typefaces. Firstly, there are <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >fixed width</literal> fonts, and variable width fonts. The fixed width fonts look like typewriter text, because each character is the same width. This quality is desirable for something like a text editor or a computer console, but not desirable for the body text of a long document. The other class is variable width. Most of the fonts you will use are variable width, though fixed width can be useful also ( for example, all the example shell commands in this document are illustrated with a fixed width font ). The most well known fixed width font is Courier.</para>
<para>There are several classifications of typefaces. Firstly, there are <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >fixed width</literal> fonts, and variable width fonts. The fixed width fonts look like typewriter text, because each character is the same width. This quality is desirable for something like a text editor or a computer console, but not desirable for the body text of a long document. The other class is variable width. Most of the fonts you will use are variable width, though fixed width can be useful also (for example, all the example shell commands in this document are illustrated with a fixed width font). The most well known fixed width font is Courier.</para>
</section>
<section id="serif" >
<title>To serif or not to serif ?</title>
<para>Serifs are little hooks on the ends of characters. For example, the letter i in a font such as Times Roman has serifs protruding from the base of the i and the head of the i. Serif fonts are <emphasis>usually</emphasis> considered more readable than fonts without serifs. There are many different types of serif fonts.</para>
<para>Sans serif fonts do not have these little hooks, so they have a starker appearance. One usually does not write a long book using a sans serif font for the body text. There are sans serif fonts that are readable enough to be well suited to documents that are supposed to be browsed / skimmed ( web pages, catalogues, marketing brochures ). Another application that sans serif fonts have is as display fonts on computer screens, especially at small sizes. The lack of detail in the font can provide it with more clarity. For example, Microsoft touts <link linkend="msfonts">Verdana</link> as being readable at very small sizes on screen.</para>
<para>Sans serif fonts do not have these little hooks, so they have a starker appearance. One usually does not write a long book using a sans serif font for the body text. There are sans serif fonts that are readable enough to be well suited to documents that are supposed to be browsed / skimmed (web pages, catalogues, marketing brochures). Another application that sans serif fonts have is as display fonts on computer screens, especially at small sizes. The lack of detail in the font can provide it with more clarity. For example, Microsoft touts <link linkend="msfonts">Verdana</link> as being readable at very small sizes on screen.</para>
<para>Notable sans serif fonts include Lucida Sans, MS Comic Sans, Verdana, Myriad, Avant Garde, Arial, Century Gothic and Helvetica. By the way, Helvetica is considered harmful by typographers. It is somewhat overused, and many books by typographers plead users to stay away from it.</para>
</section>
<section>
@ -689,11 +709,11 @@ myfonts/myfonts/font3.ttf
<para>Subtlety and lack of contrast. The old style fonts have heavy lines and light lines but the contrast in weight is subtle, not stark.</para>
</listitem>
</itemizedlist>
<para>Notable Old Style fonts include Garamond, Goudy Old Style, Jenson, and Caslon ( the latter is contentious -- some consider it transitional )</para>
<para>Notable Old Style fonts include Garamond, Goudy Old Style, Jenson, and Caslon (the latter is contentious -- some consider it transitional)</para>
</section>
<section>
<title>Moderns ( or didone )</title>
<para>The moderns are the opposite of old style fonts. These fonts typically have more character, and more attitude than their old style counterparts, and can be used to add character to a document rather than to typeset a long piece. However, nothing is black and white -- and there are some modern fonts such as computer modern and Monotype modern, and New Century Schoolbook which are very readable ( the contrast between heavy and light is softened to add readability ). They are based on the designs popular in the 19th century and later. Their distinguishing features include:</para>
<title>Moderns (or didone)</title>
<para>The moderns are the opposite of old style fonts. These fonts typically have more character, and more attitude than their old style counterparts, and can be used to add character to a document rather than to typeset a long piece. However, nothing is black and white -- and there are some modern fonts such as computer modern and Monotype modern, and New Century Schoolbook which are very readable (the contrast between heavy and light is softened to add readability). They are based on the designs popular in the 19th century and later. Their distinguishing features include:</para>
<itemizedlist>
<listitem>
<para>Lighter serifs, often just thin horizontal lines.</para>
@ -716,7 +736,7 @@ myfonts/myfonts/font3.ttf
</section>
<section>
<title>Slab Serifs</title>
<para>The slab serif fonts are so named because they have thick, block like serifs, as opposed to the smooth hooks of the old styles or the thin lines of some of the moderns. Slab serif fonts tend to be sturdy looking and are generally quite readable. Many of the slab serifs have Egyptian names -- such as Nile, and Egyptienne ( though they are not really in any way Egyptian ). These fonts are great for producing readable text that may suffer some dilution in quality ( such as photocopied documents, and documents printed on newspaper ). These fonts tend to look fairly sturdy. The most notable slab serif fonts are Clarendon, Memphis and Egyptienne, as well as several typewriter fonts. Many of the slab serif fonts are fixed width. Conversely, most ( almost all ) fixed width fonts are slab serif.</para>
<para>The slab serif fonts are so named because they have thick, block like serifs, as opposed to the smooth hooks of the old styles or the thin lines of some of the moderns. Slab serif fonts tend to be sturdy looking and are generally quite readable. Many of the slab serifs have Egyptian names -- such as Nile, and Egyptienne (though they are not really in any way Egyptian). These fonts are great for producing readable text that may suffer some dilution in quality (such as photocopied documents, and documents printed on newspaper). These fonts tend to look fairly sturdy. The most notable slab serif fonts are Clarendon, Memphis and Egyptienne, as well as several typewriter fonts. Many of the slab serif fonts are fixed width. Conversely, most (almost all) fixed width fonts are slab serif.</para>
</section>
</section>
<section>
@ -724,12 +744,12 @@ myfonts/myfonts/font3.ttf
<para>Surprisingly, the rise of sans serif fonts is a fairly recent phenomenon. The first well known sans serif fonts were designed in the 19th early 20th century. The earlier designs include Futura, Grotesque and Gill Sans. These fonts represent respectively the ``geometric'', ``grotesque'' and ``humanist'' classes of sans serif fonts.</para>
<section>
<title>Grotesque</title>
<para>The grotesques where so named because the public were initially somewhat shocked by their relatively stark design. Groteques are very bare in appearance due to the absence of serifs, and the simpler, cleaner designs. Because of their ``in your face'' appearance, grotesques are good for headlines. The more readable variations also work quite well for comic books, and marketing brochures, where the body text comes in small doses. Grotesques don't look as artsy as their geometric counterparts. Compared to the geometrics, they have more variation in weight, more strokes, they are squarer ( because they don't use such circular arcs ). They use a different upper case G and lower case a to the geometrics. While they are minimalistic but don't go to the same extreme as the brutally avant-garde geometrics.</para>
<para>The grotesques where so named because the public were initially somewhat shocked by their relatively stark design. Groteques are very bare in appearance due to the absence of serifs, and the simpler, cleaner designs. Because of their ``in your face'' appearance, grotesques are good for headlines. The more readable variations also work quite well for comic books, and marketing brochures, where the body text comes in small doses. Grotesques don't look as artsy as their geometric counterparts. Compared to the geometrics, they have more variation in weight, more strokes, they are squarer (because they don't use such circular arcs). They use a different upper case G and lower case a to the geometrics. While they are minimalistic but don't go to the same extreme as the brutally avant-garde geometrics.</para>
<para>Notable grotesques include the overused Helvetica, Grotesque, Arial, Franklin Gothic, and Univers.</para>
</section>
<section>
<title>Geometric</title>
<para>The Futura font came with the manifesto: <emphasis>form follows function</emphasis>. The geometric class of fonts has a stark minimalistic appearance. Distinguishing features include a constant line thickness ( no weight ). This is particularly conspicuous in the bold variants of a font. Bold groteques and humanist fonts often show some notable variation in weight while this rarely happens with the geometric fonts. Also notable is the precise minimalism of these designs. The characters almost always are made up from straight horizontal and vertical lines, and arcs that are very circular ( to the point where they often look as though they were drawn with a compass ). The characters have a minimal number of strokes. This gives them a contemporary look in that they embrace the minimalistic philosophy that would later take the world of modern art by storm. A tell tale sign that a font is a geometric type is the upper case ``G'', which consists of a minimalistic combination of two strokes -- a long circular arc and a horizontal line. The other character that stands out is the lower case ``a'' -- which is again two simple strokes, a straight vertical line and a circle ( the other ``a'' character is more complex which is why it is not used ). Notable geometrics include Avant Garde, Futura, and Century Gothic.</para>
<para>The Futura font came with the manifesto: <emphasis>form follows function</emphasis>. The geometric class of fonts has a stark minimalistic appearance. Distinguishing features include a constant line thickness (no weight). This is particularly conspicuous in the bold variants of a font. Bold groteques and humanist fonts often show some notable variation in weight while this rarely happens with the geometric fonts. Also notable is the precise minimalism of these designs. The characters almost always are made up from straight horizontal and vertical lines, and arcs that are very circular (to the point where they often look as though they were drawn with a compass). The characters have a minimal number of strokes. This gives them a contemporary look in that they embrace the minimalistic philosophy that would later take the world of modern art by storm. A tell tale sign that a font is a geometric type is the upper case ``G'', which consists of a minimalistic combination of two strokes -- a long circular arc and a horizontal line. The other character that stands out is the lower case ``a'' -- which is again two simple strokes, a straight vertical line and a circle (the other ``a'' character is more complex which is why it is not used). Notable geometrics include Avant Garde, Futura, and Century Gothic.</para>
</section>
<section>
<title>Humanist</title>
@ -752,7 +772,7 @@ the geometrics or humanists.</para>
<para>From reading this, one gets the impression that their
philosophy is essentially to match the more conservative
serifs with the more moderate sans serifs, and pair the
wilder modern serifs with the avant garde looking ( pun unavoidable )
wilder modern serifs with the avant garde looking (pun unavoidable)
geometrics.</para>
</section>
</section>
@ -776,25 +796,25 @@ i character.</para>
<title>Small caps fonts</title>
<para>Small caps fonts are fonts that have reduced size upper case letters
in place of the lower case letters. These are useful for writing
headings that require emphasis ( and they are often used in LaTeX ).
headings that require emphasis (and they are often used in LaTeX).
Typically, when one writes a heading in small caps, they use a large
cap for the beginning of each word, and small capitals for the rest
of the word ( ``title case'' ). The advantage of this over using
of the word (``title case''). The advantage of this over using
all caps is that you get something that is much more readable
( using all caps is a big typographic sin ).</para>
(using all caps is a big typographic sin).</para>
</section>
<section>
<title>Expert fonts</title>
<para>Expert fonts consist of several extras designed to supplement a typeface.
These include things like ligatures, ornaments ( much like a
mini-dingbats collection designed to go with the typeface ),
small caps fonts, and swash capitals ( fancy, calligraphic letters ).</para>
These include things like ligatures, ornaments (much like a
mini-dingbats collection designed to go with the typeface),
small caps fonts, and swash capitals (fancy, calligraphic letters).</para>
</section>
</section>
<section>
<title>Font Metrics and Shapes</title>
<para>Font metrics define the spacing between variable width fonts. The metrics include information about the size of the font, and <emphasis>kerning</emphasis> information, which assigns kerning pairs -- pairs of characters that should be given different spacing. For example, the letters ``To'' would usually belong in a kerning pair, because correctly spaced ( or kerned ), the o should partly sit under the T. Typesetting programs such as LaTeX need to know information about kerning so that they can make decisions about where to break lines and pages. The same applies to WYSIWYG publishing programs.</para>
<para>The other important component of a font is the outline, or shape. The components of the fonts shape ( a stroke, an accent, etc ) are called <emphasis>glyphs</emphasis>.</para>
<para>Font metrics define the spacing between variable width fonts. The metrics include information about the size of the font, and <emphasis>kerning</emphasis> information, which assigns kerning pairs -- pairs of characters that should be given different spacing. For example, the letters ``To'' would usually belong in a kerning pair, because correctly spaced (or kerned), the o should partly sit under the T. Typesetting programs such as LaTeX need to know information about kerning so that they can make decisions about where to break lines and pages. The same applies to WYSIWYG publishing programs.</para>
<para>The other important component of a font is the outline, or shape. The components of the fonts shape (a stroke, an accent, etc) are called <emphasis>glyphs</emphasis>.</para>
</section>
</section>
<section id="fontech" >
@ -809,13 +829,13 @@ small caps fonts, and swash capitals ( fancy, calligraphic letters ).</para>
</section>
<section id="truetype" >
<title>TrueType Fonts</title>
<para>TrueType fonts were developed by Apple. They made the format available to Microsoft, and successfully challenged Adobe's grip on the font market. True type fonts store the metric and shape information in a single file ( usually one with a <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >ttf</literal> extension ). Recently, font servers have been developed that make TrueType available to X. And PostScript and ghostscript have supported TrueType fonts for some time. Because of this, TrueType fonts are becoming more popular on linux.</para>
<para>TrueType fonts were developed by Apple. They made the format available to Microsoft, and successfully challenged Adobe's grip on the font market. True type fonts store the metric and shape information in a single file (usually one with a <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >ttf</literal> extension). Recently, font servers have been developed that make TrueType available to X. And PostScript and ghostscript have supported TrueType fonts for some time. Because of this, TrueType fonts are becoming more popular on linux.</para>
</section>
<section id="type1" >
<title>Type 1 Fonts</title>
<para>The Type 1 font standard was devised by Adobe, and Type 1 fonts are supported by Adobe's PostScript standard. Because of this, they are also well supported under linux. They are supported by X and ghostscript. Postscript fonts have traditionally been the choice of font for anything on UNIX that involves printing.</para>
<para>Typically, a UNIX Type 1 font is distributed as an <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >afm</literal> (adobe font metric) file, and an outline file, which is usually a <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >pfb</literal> ( printer font binary ) or <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >pfa</literal> (printer font ascii) file. The outline file contains all the glyphs, while the metric file contains the metrics. </para>
<para>Type 1 fonts for other platforms may be distributed in different formats. For example, PostScript fonts for windows often use a different format ( <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >pfm</literal> ) for the metric file.</para>
<para>Typically, a UNIX Type 1 font is distributed as an <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >afm</literal> (adobe font metric) file, and an outline file, which is usually a <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >pfb</literal> (printer font binary) or <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >pfa</literal> (printer font ascii) file. The outline file contains all the glyphs, while the metric file contains the metrics. </para>
<para>Type 1 fonts for other platforms may be distributed in different formats. For example, PostScript fonts for windows often use a different format (<literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >pfm</literal>) for the metric file.</para>
</section>
<section id="type3" >
<title>Type3 Fonts</title>
@ -828,8 +848,8 @@ small caps fonts, and swash capitals ( fancy, calligraphic letters ).</para>
<section id="T1vsTT" >
<title>Type 1 vs TrueType -- a comparison</title>
<para>Despite the historical feuding between the proponents to Type 1 and TrueType fonts, both have a lot in common. Both are scalable outline fonts. Type 1 fonts use cubic as opposed to quadratic curves for the glyphs. This is in theory at least a slight advantage since they include all the curves available to TrueType fonts. In practice, it makes very little difference. </para>
<para>TrueType fonts have the apparent advantage that their support for hinting is better ( Type 1 fonts do have hinting functionality, but it is not as extensive as that of TrueType fonts ). However, this is only an issue on low resolution devices, such as screens ( the improved hinting makes no discernable difference on a 600dpi printer, even at small point sizes. ) The other point that makes this apparent advantage somewhat questionable is the fact that well hinted TrueType fonts are rare. This is because software packages that support hinting functionality are out of the budget of most small time designers. Only a few major foundries, such as Monotype make well hinted fonts available.</para>
<para>In conclusion, the main differences between TrueType and Type 1 fonts are in availability and application support. The widespread availability of TrueType fonts for Windows has resulted in webpages designed with the assumption that certain TrueType fonts are available. Also, many users have large numbers of TrueType fonts because they ship with the users Windows applications. However, on Linux, most applications support Type 1 fonts but do not have the same level of support for TrueType. Moreover, most major font foundries still ship most of their fonts in Type 1 format. For example, Adobe ships very few TrueType fonts. My recommendation to users is to use whatever works for your application, and try to avoid converting from one format to another where possible ( because the format conversion is not without loss ).</para>
<para>TrueType fonts have the apparent advantage that their support for hinting is better (Type 1 fonts do have hinting functionality, but it is not as extensive as that of TrueType fonts). However, this is only an issue on low resolution devices, such as screens (the improved hinting makes no discernable difference on a 600dpi printer, even at small point sizes.) The other point that makes this apparent advantage somewhat questionable is the fact that well hinted TrueType fonts are rare. This is because software packages that support hinting functionality are out of the budget of most small time designers. Only a few major foundries, such as Monotype make well hinted fonts available.</para>
<para>In conclusion, the main differences between TrueType and Type 1 fonts are in availability and application support. The widespread availability of TrueType fonts for Windows has resulted in webpages designed with the assumption that certain TrueType fonts are available. Also, many users have large numbers of TrueType fonts because they ship with the users Windows applications. However, on Linux, most applications support Type 1 fonts but do not have the same level of support for TrueType. Moreover, most major font foundries still ship most of their fonts in Type 1 format. For example, Adobe ships very few TrueType fonts. My recommendation to users is to use whatever works for your application, and try to avoid converting from one format to another where possible (because the format conversion is not without loss).</para>
</section>
</section>
<section id="getfonts" >
@ -858,18 +878,18 @@ small caps fonts, and swash capitals ( fancy, calligraphic letters ).</para>
<title>Type 1 Fonts and Metafont</title>
<section>
<title>Dealing With Mac and Windows Formats</title>
<para>Many foundries ship fonts with Windows and Mac users in mind. This can sometimes pose a problem. Typically, the ``Windows fonts'' are fairly easy to handle, because they are packed in a <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >zip</literal> file. The only work to be done is converting the <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >pfm</literal> file to and <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >afm</literal> file ( using <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >pfm2afm</literal>).</para>
<para>Macintosh fonts are more problematic, because they are typically made available in <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >.sit.bin</literal> format -- stuffit archives. Unfortunately, there is no tool for Linux that can unpack stuffit archives created with the newer version of stuffit. The only way to do it is run Executor ( Mac emulator ), or try running stuffit in dosemu or Wine. Once the <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >sit.bin</literal> file is unpacked, the Macintosh files can be converted using <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >t1unmac</literal> which comes with the <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >t1utils</literal> package.</para>
<para>Many foundries ship fonts with Windows and Mac users in mind. This can sometimes pose a problem. Typically, the ``Windows fonts'' are fairly easy to handle, because they are packed in a <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >zip</literal> file. The only work to be done is converting the <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >pfm</literal> file to and <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >afm</literal> file (using <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >pfm2afm</literal>).</para>
<para>Macintosh fonts are more problematic, because they are typically made available in <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >.sit.bin</literal> format -- stuffit archives. Unfortunately, there is no tool for Linux that can unpack stuffit archives created with the newer version of stuffit. The only way to do it is run Executor (Mac emulator), or try running stuffit in dosemu or Wine. Once the <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >sit.bin</literal> file is unpacked, the Macintosh files can be converted using <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >t1unmac</literal> which comes with the <literal remap="tt" moreinfo="NONE" >t1utils</literal> package.</para>
<para>Unfortunately, some vendors only ship Type 1 fonts in Macintosh format (stuffit archives). However, according to font expert <ulink url="http://cgm.cs.mcgill.ca/~luc/" >Luc Devroye</ulink>, all major foundries make Type 1 fonts available for Mac and Windows.</para>
</section>
<section>
<title>Free Stuff</title>
<para>
<ulink url="http://www.ctan.org" >ctan</ulink> have a number of good fonts, many of which are free. Most of these are in Metafont format, though some are also Type 1 fonts. Also, see <ulink url="http://www.bluesky.com" >Bluesky</ulink> who have made available Type 1 versions of the computer modern fonts. ( The computer modern fonts are of excellent quality -- to purchase anything of comparable quality and completeness will cost you around $500-. They are comparable to the premium fonts.)</para>
<ulink url="http://www.ctan.org" >ctan</ulink> have a number of good fonts, many of which are free. Most of these are in Metafont format, though some are also Type 1 fonts. Also, see <ulink url="http://www.bluesky.com" >Bluesky</ulink> who have made available Type 1 versions of the computer modern fonts. (The computer modern fonts are of excellent quality -- to purchase anything of comparable quality and completeness will cost you around $500-. They are comparable to the premium fonts.)</para>
<para>
<ulink url="http://cgm.cs.mcgill.ca/~luc/originalfonts.html" >Luc Devroye's webpage</ulink> has links to several sites with free fonts available. What's unique about these fonts is that a lot of them are really free, they are not ``warez fonts''.</para>
<para>URW have released the standard PostScript fonts resident in most printers to the public domain. These fonts are quite good.</para>
<para>The <ulink url="ftp://ftp.cdrom.com/pub/os2/fonts/" >Walnut Creek Archive</ulink> has several freely available fonts, and shareware fonts. Some of these are obvious ripoffs ( and not very good ones ). If a font doesn't come with some kind of license, chances are it's a ripoff. Also <ulink url="http://www.winsite.com/win3/fonts/atm/" >Winsite</ulink> have several Type 1 fonts ( in the fonts/atm subsection of their windows 3.x software ). Unfortunately, several of these have afm files which have mistakes and are missing all kerning pairs ( you can fix the afms by editing the &quot;FontName&quot; section of the afm files. It should match the fontname given in the font shape file. Of course, adding kerning pairs is a topic beyond the scope of this document.)</para>
<para>The <ulink url="ftp://ftp.cdrom.com/pub/os2/fonts/" >Walnut Creek Archive</ulink> has several freely available fonts, and shareware fonts. Some of these are obvious ripoffs (and not very good ones). If a font doesn't come with some kind of license, chances are it's a ripoff. Also <ulink url="http://www.winsite.com/win3/fonts/atm/" >Winsite</ulink> have several Type 1 fonts (in the fonts/atm subsection of their windows 3.x software). Unfortunately, several of these have afm files which have mistakes and are missing all kerning pairs (you can fix the afms by editing the &quot;FontName&quot; section of the afm files. It should match the fontname given in the font shape file. Of course, adding kerning pairs is a topic beyond the scope of this document.)</para>
<para>
<ulink url="http://cgm.cs.mcgill.ca/~luc/" >Luc Devroye's webpage</ulink> includes several free fonts he designed, as well as a lot of links, and fascinating discussion on the topic of typography. This site is a ``must-visit''. There are also several links to many foundries.</para>
</section>
@ -886,7 +906,7 @@ small caps fonts, and swash capitals ( fancy, calligraphic letters ).</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<emphasis>Completeness:</emphasis> The higher quality fonts (notably from Adobe) come in several variants, with some nice supplements to provide the user with a more complete font family. There are often bold, italic, and demibold variants, swash capitals, small caps, old style figures, and extra ligatures to supplement the font. More recently, Adobe have a multiple master technology which gives the user ( almost ) infinite variation within one font family.</para>
<emphasis>Completeness:</emphasis> The higher quality fonts (notably from Adobe) come in several variants, with some nice supplements to provide the user with a more complete font family. There are often bold, italic, and demibold variants, swash capitals, small caps, old style figures, and extra ligatures to supplement the font. More recently, Adobe have a multiple master technology which gives the user (almost) infinite variation within one font family.</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
@ -967,7 +987,7 @@ small caps fonts, and swash capitals ( fancy, calligraphic letters ).</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<ulink url="http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~ghost/" >Ghostscript</ulink> is the software that is used for printing on Linux. The version of ghostscript that ships with Linux is GNU ghostscript. This is one version behind the latest release of Aladdin ghostscript ( who release their old versions under the GPL)</para>
<ulink url="http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~ghost/" >Ghostscript</ulink> is the software that is used for printing on Linux. The version of ghostscript that ships with Linux is GNU ghostscript. This is one version behind the latest release of Aladdin ghostscript (who release their old versions under the GPL)</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
@ -1022,11 +1042,11 @@ small caps fonts, and swash capitals ( fancy, calligraphic letters ).</para>
<itemizedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
<ulink url="http://cgm.cs.mcgill.ca/~luc/" >Luc Devroye's homepage</ulink> Contains enough information about fonts and other things to sink a ship. This guy designed a bunch of free fonts, and his homepage has a lot of interesting links, information and commentary.</para>
<ulink url="http://cg.scs.carleton.ca/~luc/" >Luc Devroye's homepage</ulink> contains enough information about fonts and other things to sink a ship. This guy designed a bunch of free fonts, and his homepage has a lot of interesting links, information and commentary.</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
<ulink url="http://www.scribus.org.uk/modules.php?op=modload&amp;name=Web_Links&amp;file=index&amp;req=viewlink&amp;cid=3" >Scribus list of high quality fonts</ulink>. <ulink url="http://www.scribus.org.uk/" >Scribus</ulink> is an Open Source desktop publishing project.</para>
<ulink url="http://www.scribus.org.uk/" >Scribus</ulink> is an Open Source desktop publishing project. The project web site provides a list of high quality fonts.</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
@ -1102,7 +1122,7 @@ contains a lot of links to sites on PostScript and fonts.</para>
<glossentry id="gcharset">
<glossterm>Charset</glossterm>
<glossdef>
<para>A group of 8-bit glyphs. For example, the ISO-8859-1 (a.k.a. Latin-1) contain the regular latin chars for west european languages, ISO-8859-8 contain the hebrew chars, ISO-8859-5 have the cyrillic chars, etc. The concept is now obsolete due the advent of Unicode. Linux' base C library (libc) contain the technology to convert text from one charset to another and to/from Unicode.</para>
<para>A group of 8-bit glyphs. For example, the ISO-8859-1 (a.k.a. Latin-1) contain the regular latin chars for west european languages, ISO-8859-8 contain the hebrew chars, ISO-8859-5 have the cyrillic chars, etc. The concept is now obsolete due to the advent of Unicode. Linux' base C library (libc) contain the technology to convert text from one charset to another and to/from Unicode.</para>
</glossdef>
</glossentry>
<glossentry id="gdpi" >
@ -1276,17 +1296,17 @@ contains a lot of links to sites on PostScript and fonts.</para>
<para>This document is a unification of the two former font HOWTOs available at <ulink url="http://tldp.org/" >TLDP.org</ulink>: <ulink url="http://www.pegasus.rutgers.edu/~elflord/font_howto/" >Donovan Rebbechi's original Font-HOWTO</ulink>, and <ulink url="http://burgiss.net/ldp/fdu/" >Hal Burgiss' original Font Deuglification HOWTO</ulink>.</para>
<itemizedlist>
<listitem><para>Donovan Rebbechi wrote part of the <xref linkend="glossary"/> and sections starting from <xref linkend="typography"/></para></listitem>
<listitem><para>Hal Burgiss wrote <xref linkend="bci"/></para></listitem>
<listitem><para>Hal Burgiss wrote <xref linkend="bci"/> with some updates by Avi Alkalay</para></listitem>
<listitem><para><xref linkend="xorg"/> was borrowed from Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 Release Notes</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>Everything else written by Avi Alkalay</para></listitem>
</itemizedlist>
<para>Many things changed on Linux' font infrastructure since the former HOWTOs were published, so all obsolete parts were removed.</para>
<para>This document must be distributed under the terms of <ulink url="http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html" >GNU Free Documentation License</ulink>. Please translate, adapt, improve, redistrubute using the original XML DocBook source right bellow. Let me know if you want me to put a link to your translation/adaptation/improvement here.</para>
<para>This document must be distributed under the terms of <ulink url="http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html" >GNU Free Documentation License</ulink>. Please translate, adapt, improve, redistrubute using the original XML DocBook source right below. Let me know if you want me to put a link to your translation/adaptation/improvement here.</para>
<para>This document is published in the following locations:
<itemizedlist>
<listitem>
<para>
<ulink url="http://avi.alkalay.net/linux/docs/font-howto/" >Official site, with better fonts and layout</ulink> [<ulink url="http://avi.alkalay.net/linux/docs/font-howto/font-howto-20060702.tar.gz" >XML (DocBook) Source</ulink>]</para>
<ulink url="http://avi.alkalay.net/linux/docs/font-howto/" >Official site, with better fonts and layout</ulink> [<ulink url="http://avi.alkalay.net/linux/docs/font-howto/font-howto-20070208.tar.gz" >XML (DocBook) Source</ulink>]</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>

2
LDP/howto/docbook/HOWTO-INDEX/appsSect.sgml
View File

@ -1404,7 +1404,7 @@ configuring the X Window System for Linux users. </Para>
Font-HOWTO</ULink>,
<CiteTitle>Optimal Use of Fonts on Linux (Font HOWTO)</CiteTitle>
</Para><Para>
<CiteTitle>Updated: Jul 2006</CiteTitle>.
<CiteTitle>Updated: Feb 2007</CiteTitle>.
Provides a comprehensive source to act as a starting point for any
and all font questions about Linux. </Para>
</ListItem>

2
LDP/howto/docbook/HOWTO-INDEX/howtoChap.sgml
View File

@ -1433,7 +1433,7 @@ fit in better with Linux). </Para>
Font-HOWTO</ULink>,
<CiteTitle>Optimal Use of Fonts on Linux (Font HOWTO)</CiteTitle>
</Para><Para>
<CiteTitle>Updated: Jul 2006</CiteTitle>.
<CiteTitle>Updated: Feb 2007</CiteTitle>.
Provides a comprehensive source to act as a starting point for any
and all font questions about Linux. </Para>
</ListItem>