Re: [CAD_CAM_EDM_DRO] fonts

----- Original Message -----
From: Jon Elson <jmelson@...>

>
> Unfortunately, PostScript and many other systems use bitmaps to create
> the printed fonts. There is a system called MetaFont that was used to
> create fonts for the TeX typesetting program. It is available for free,
>
> not exactly public domain, but essentially the same. Unfortunately, it
> is QUITE complicated, and I have never used it, as it would take some
> serious learning. Also, it produces those darn bitmaps, again. But,
> the
> DEFINITIONS it uses to make those fonts IS a vector and arc format.
> I think the input format is pretty easy to read, ASCII text with
> floating
> point numbers.
>
> Jon
>

PMFJI, but I thought I should make some comments about PostScript fonts.

First, to quote from "PostScript Language Tutorial and Cookbook" by Adobe
Systems, published Addison-Wesley:

"5.2 Printing Variety

Point Sizes
The fact that PostScript internally descibes its fonts as shape descriptions
allows the fonts to be scaled while retaining fidelity at large sizes."

and

"9.4 Character Outlines

Each font dictionary contains descriptions of the shapes of its characters.
Most fonts describe their characters as outlines that are filled when the
character is printed. Other fonts describe characters as lines to be stroked
or as bit maps."

From practical experience I can say it is quite possible to extract font
outline from PostScript fonts. Many years ago (at University) I wrote a
small parser that extracted font outlines from BitStream PostScript fonts
for input into a ray-tracing program, so I could include 3D text into
images.

Changing tack a little to TrueType fonts (as mentioned my someone else),
these are also outline based fonts so they can be scaled. If you are into
Windows development, there is a standard API call available that will return
the outline information as a series of line segments and bezier curves
(GetGlyphOutline()).

Regards,
Alistair Ward.