Date: Wed, 7 Aug 1996 20:39:35 -0500 From: Dave Bodenstab <imdave@synet.net> To: doc@freebsd.org Subject: Font cookbook in .sgml format Message-ID: <199608080139.UAA23821@base486.synet.net>
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Here's my font cookbook in sgml format. I've made a few corrections
and some small additions. If the "powers that be" decide that this can
be used in either the FAQ or handbook, I'd like to hear about it -- just
to make me feel good about spending the time! Anyway, here it is.
Hope it's useful. Feedback/corrections are very welcome.
Dave Bodenstab
imdave@synet.net
--------------------------------
<!DOCTYPE linuxdoc PUBLIC "-//FreeBSD//DTD linuxdoc//EN">
<!-- Recently, I wanted to figure out how to use some additional fonts that
I had accumulated. I finally figured out *how to do it* from the various
man pages and documentation. Since it might be of use to other users,
and I didn't see any reference to this topic in the FAQ or handbook, I
thought I'd try my hand at a simple cookbook tutorial addressing the
use of fonts. I have included my unanswered questions at the end of
the document.
Anyway, here's what I put together. This is my present understanding of
fonts and how to use them with FreeBSD. I am sure that there are errors or
misunderstandings, but it contains enough valid information to allow the
use of additional fonts with Ghostscript, X11 and Groff. This is my first
attempt to write anything along the lines of a tutorial/FAQ, so I am sure
it is pretty raw. There are probably better ways to do some of this stuff,
and I would welcome being corrected.
-->
<article>
<title>Fonts and FreeBSD -- A Tutorial
<author>Dave Bodenstab, <imdave@synet.net>
<date>Wed Aug 7, 1996
<abstract>
This document contains a description of the various font files that may
be used with FreeBSD and the syscons driver, X11, Ghostscript and Groff.
Cookbook examples are provided for switching the syscons display to
80x60 mode, and for using type 1 fonts with the above application programs.
</abstract>
<sect>Introduction
<p>
There are many sources of fonts available, and one might ask how they might
be used with FreeBSD.
The answer can be found by carefully searching the documentation for the
component that one would like to use.
This is very time consuming, so this tutorial is an attempt to provide a shortcut
for others who might be interested.
<sect>Basic terminology
<p>
There are many different font formats and associated font file suffixes.
A few that will be addressed here are:
<descrip>
<tag/.pfa .pfb/ Postscript type 1 fonts. The <em/.pfa/ is the <bf/A/scii form
and <em/.pfb/ the <bf/B/inary form.
<tag/.afm/ The font metrics associated with a type 1 font.
<tag/.pfm/ The printer font metrics associated with a type 1 font.
<tag/.ttf/ A TrueType font
<tag/.fot/ An indirect reference to a TrueType font (not an actual font)
<tag/.fon .fnt/ Bitmapped screen fonts
</descrip>
<p>
The <em/.fot/ file is used by Windows as sort of a symbolic link to the actual
TrueType font (<em/.ttf/) file. The <em/.fon/ font files are also used by Windows.
I know of no way to use this font format with FreeBSD.
<sect>What font formats can I use?
<p>
Which font file format is useful depends on the application being used.
FreeBSD by itself uses no fonts. Application programs and/or drivers may
make use of the font files. Here is a small cross reference of
application/driver to the font type suffixes:
<descrip>
<tag/Driver/
<descrip>
<tag/syscons/ .fnt
</descrip>
<tag/Application/
<descrip>
<tag/Ghostscript/ <em/.pfa/ <em/.pfb/ <em/.ttf/
<tag/X11/ <em/.pfa/ <em/.pfb/
<tag/Groff/ <em/.pfa/ <em/.afm/
<tag/Povray/ <em/.ttf/
</descrip>
</descrip>
<p>
The <em/.fnt/ suffix is used quite frequently. I suspect that whenever someone
wanted to create a specialized font file for their application, more often
than not they chose this suffix. Therefore, it is likely that files with
this suffix are not all the same format; specifically, the <em/.fnt/ files used
by syscons under FreeBSD may not be the same format as a <em/.fnt/ file one
encounters in the MSDOS/Windows environment. I have not made any attempt
at using other <em/.fnt/ files other than those provided with FreeBSD.
<sect>Setting a virtual console to 80x60 line mode
<p>
First, a 8x8 font must be loaded. <tt>/etc/sysconfig</tt> should contain the lines:
<tscreen><verb>
# Choose font 8x8 from /usr/share/syscons/fonts/* (or NO for default)
font8x8=/usr/share/syscons/fonts/cp437-8x8.fnt
</verb></tscreen>
<p>
The command to actually switch the mode is <em/vidcontrol/(1):
<tscreen><verb>
bash$ vidcontrol VGA_80x60
</verb></tscreen>
<p>
Various screen orientated programs, such as <em/vi/(1), must be able to determine
the current screen dimensions. These can be set with <em/stty/(1):
<tscreen><verb>
bash$ stty crt rows 60 columns 80
</verb></tscreen>
<p>
To make this more seamless, one can embed these commands in the startup
scripts so it takes place when the system boots. One way to do this is:
<enum>
<item> Modify <tt>/etc/sysconfig</tt> as above
<item> Add to <tt>/etc/rc.local</tt>:
<tscreen><verb>
for tty in /dev/ttyv?
do
vidcontrol VGA_80x60 <$tty >/dev/null 2>&1
done
</verb></tscreen>
<item> Add to <tt>/etc/profile</tt>:
<tscreen><verb>
TTYNAME=`basename \`tty\``
if expr "$TTYNAME" : 'ttyv' >/dev/null
then
stty crt rows 60 columns 80
fi
</verb></tscreen>
</enum>
<p>
References: <em/stty/(1), <em/vidcontrol/(1)
<sect>Using type 1 fonts with X11
<p>
X11 can use either the <em/.pfa/ or the <em/.pfb/ format fonts. The X11 fonts are
located in various subdirectories under <tt>/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts</tt>. Each
font file is cross referenced to
its X11 name by the contents of the <tt/fonts.dir/ file in each directory.
<p>
There is already a directory named <tt/Type1/.
The most straight forward way to add a
new font is to put it into this directory. A better way is to keep all new
fonts in a separate directory and use a symbolic link to the additional
font. This allows one to more easily keep track of ones fonts without
confusing them with the fonts that were originally provided. For example:
<tscreen><verb>
# Create a directory to contain the font files
bash$ mkdir -p /usr/local/share/fonts/type1
bash$ cd /usr/local/share/fonts/type1
# Place the .pfa, .pfb and .afm files here
# One might want to keep readme files, and other documentation
# for the fonts here also
bash$ cp /cdrom/fonts/atm/showboat/showboat.pfb .
bash$ cp /cdrom/fonts/atm/showboat/showboat.afm .
# Maintain an index to cross reference the fonts
bash$ echo showboat - InfoMagic CICA, Dec 1994, /fonts/atm/showboat >>INDEX
</verb></tscreen>
<p>
Now, to use a new font with X11, one must make the font file available and
update the font name files. The X11 font names look like:
<tscreen><verb>
-bitstream-charter-medium-r-normal-xxx-0-0-0-0-p-0-iso8859-1
| | | | | | | | | | | | \ \
| | | | | \ \ \ \ \ \ \ +----+- character set
| | | | \ \ \ \ \ \ \ +- average width
| | | | \ \ \ \ \ \ +- spacing
| | | \ \ \ \ \ \ +- vertical res.
| | | \ \ \ \ \ +- horizontal res.
| | | \ \ \ \ +- points
| | | \ \ \ +- pixels
| | | \ \ \
foundry family weight slant width additional style
</verb></tscreen>
<p>
A new name needs to be created for each new font. If you have some information
from the documentation that accompanied the font, then it could serve as the basis
for creating the name. If there is no information, then you can get some idea
by using <em/strings/(1) on the font file. For example:
<tscreen><verb>
bash$ strings showboat.pfb | more
%!FontType1-1.0: Showboat 001.001
%%CreationDate: 1/15/91 5:16:03 PM
%%VMusage: 1024 45747
% Generated by Fontographer 3.1
% Showboat
1991 by David Rakowski. Alle Rechte Vorbehalten.
FontDirectory/Showboat known{/Showboat findfont dup/UniqueID known{dup
/UniqueID get 4962377 eq exch/FontType get 1 eq and}{pop false}ifelse
{save true}{false}ifelse}{false}ifelse
12 dict begin
/FontInfo 9 dict dup begin
/version (001.001) readonly def
/FullName (Showboat) readonly def
/FamilyName (Showboat) readonly def
/Weight (Medium) readonly def
/ItalicAngle 0 def
/isFixedPitch false def
/UnderlinePosition -106 def
/UnderlineThickness 16 def
/Notice (Showboat
1991 by David Rakowski. Alle Rechte Vorbehalten.) readonly def
end readonly def
/FontName /Showboat def
--stdin--
</verb></tscreen>
<p>
Using this information, a possible name might be:
<tscreen><verb>
-type1-Showboat-medium-r-normal-decorative-0-0-0-0-p-0-iso8859-1
</verb></tscreen>
The components of our name are:
<itemize>
<item>Foundry - lets just name all the new fonts <tt/type1/.
<item>Family - the name of the font.
<item>Weight - normal, bold, medium, semibold, etc. From the <em/strings/(1) output
above, it appears that this font has a weight of <em/medium/.
<item>Slant - <bf/r/oman, <bf/i/talic, <bf/o/blique, etc. Since the <em/ItalicAngle/
is zero, <em/roman/ will be used.
<item>Width - normal, wide, condensed, extended, etc. Until it can be examined,
the assumption will be <em/normal/.
<item>Additional style - usually omitted, but this will indicate that
the font contains decorative capital letters.
<item>Spacing - proportional or monospaced. <em/Proportional/ is used since <em/isFixedPitch/ is false.
</itemize>
<p>
All of these names are arbitrary, but one should strive to be compatible
with the existing conventions. A font is referenced by name with possible
wild cards by an X11 program, so the name chosen should make some sense.
One might begin by simply using
<descrip>
<tt/...-normal-r-normal-...-p-.../
</descrip>
as the name,
and then use <em/xfontsel/(1) to examine it and adjust the name based on
the appearance of the font.
<p>
So, to complete our example:
<tscreen><verb>
# Make the font accessible to X11
bash$ cd /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Type1
bash$ ln -s /usr/local/share/fonts/type1/showboat.pfb .
# Edit fonts.dir and fonts.scale, adding the line describing the font
# and incrementing the number of fonts which is found on the first line.
bash$ ex fonts.dir
:1p
25
:1c
26
.
:$a
showboat.pfb -type1-showboat-medium-r-normal-decorative-0-0-0-0-p-0-iso8859-1
.
:wq
# fonts.scale seems to be identical to fonts.dir...
bash$ cp fonts.dir fonts.scale
# Tell X11 that things have changed
bash$ xset fp rehash
# Examine the new font
bash$ xfontsel -pattern -type1-*
</verb></tscreen>
<p>
References: <em/xfontsel/(1), <em/xset/(1), <em/The X Windows System in a Nutshell/,
O'Reilly & Associates
<sect>Using type 1 fonts with Ghostscript
<p>
Ghostscript references a font via its <tt/Fontmap/ file. This must be modified
in a similar way to the X11 <tt/fonts.dir/ file. Ghostscript can use either the
<em/.pfa/ or the <em/.pfb/ format fonts. Using the font from the previous example,
here is how to use it with Ghostscript:
<tscreen><verb>
# Put the font in Ghostscript's font directory
bash$ cd /usr/local/share/ghostscript/fonts
bash$ ln -s /usr/local/share/fonts/type1/showboat.pfb .
# Edit Fontmap so Ghostscript knows about the font
bash$ cd /usr/local/share/ghostscript/4.01
bash$ ex Fontmap
:$a
/Showboat (showboat.pfb) ; % From CICA /fonts/atm/showboat
.
:wq
# Use Ghostscript to examine the font
bash$ gs prfont.ps
Aladdin Ghostscript 4.01 (1996-7-10)
Copyright (C) 1996 Aladdin Enterprises, Menlo Park, CA. All rights
reserved.
This software comes with NO WARRANTY: see the file PUBLIC for details.
Loading Times-Roman font from /usr/local/share/ghostscript/fonts/tir_____.pfb...
/1899520 581354 1300084 13826 0 done.
GS>Showboat DoFont
Loading Showboat font from /usr/local/share/ghostscript/fonts/showboat.pfb...
1939688 565415 1300084 16901 0 done.
>>showpage, press <return> to continue<<
>>showpage, press <return> to continue<<
>>showpage, press <return> to continue<<
GS>quit
</verb></tscreen>
<p>
References: <tt/fonts.txt/ in the Ghostscript 4.01 distribution
<sect>Using type 1 fonts with Groff
<p>
Now that the new font can be used by both X11 and Ghostscript, how can one
use the new font with groff? First of all, since we are dealing with type 1
postscript fonts, the groff device that is applicable is the <em/ps/ device.
A font file must be created for each font that groff can use. A groff font
name is just a file in <tt>/usr/share/groff_font/devps</tt>. With our example, the
font file could be <tt>/usr/share/groff_font/devps/SHOWBOAT</tt>. The file must be
created using tools provided by groff.
<p>
The first tool is <em/afmtodit/. This is not normally installed, so it must be
retrieved from the source distribution. I found I had to change the first
line of the file, so I did:
<tscreen><verb>
bash$ cp /usr/src/gnu/usr.bin/groff/afmtodit/afmtodit.pl /tmp
bash$ ex /tmp/afmtodit.pl
:1c
#!/usr/bin/perl -P-
.
:wq
</verb></tscreen>
<p>
This tool will create the groff font file from the metrics file (<em/.afm/ suffix.)
Continuing with our example:
<tscreen><verb>
# Many .afm files are in Mac format... ^M delimited lines
# We need to convert them to unix style ^J delimited lines
bash$ cd /tmp
bash$ cat /usr/local/share/fonts/type1/showboat.afm |
tr '\015' '\012' >showboat.afm
# Now create the groff font file
bash$ cd /usr/share/groff_font/devps
bash$ /tmp/afmtodit.pl -d DESC -e text.enc /tmp/showboat.afm generate/textmap SHOWBOAT
</verb></tscreen>
<p>
The font can now be referenced with the name SHOWBOAT.
<p>
If ghostscript is used to drive the printers on the system, then nothing
more needs to be done. However, if true postscript printers are used, then
the font must be down loaded to the printer in order for the font to be used
(unless the printer happens to have the showboat font built in or on an
accessible font disk.) The final step is to create a down loadable font.
The <em/pfbtops/ tool is used to create the <em/.pfa/ format of the font, and the
<tt/download/ file is modified to reference the new font. The <tt/download/ file
must reference the internal name of the font. This can easily be determined
from the groff font file as illustrated:
<tscreen><verb>
# Create the .pfa font file
bash$ pfbtops /usr/local/share/fonts/type1/showboat.pfb >showboat.pfa
</verb></tscreen>
<p>
Of course, if the <em/.pfa/ file is already available, just use a symbolic link
to reference it.
<tscreen><verb>
# Get the internal font name
bash$ fgrep internalname SHOWBOAT
internalname Showboat
# Tell groff that the font must be down loaded
bash$ ex download
:$a
Showboat showboat.pfa
.
:wq
</verb></tscreen>
<p>
To test the font:
<tscreen><verb>
bash$ cd /tmp
bash$ cat >example.t <<EOF
.sp 5
.ps 16
This is an example of the Showboat font:
.br
.ps 48
.vs (\n(.s+2)p
.sp
.ft SHOWBOAT
ABCDEFGHI
.br
JKLMNOPQR
.br
STUVWXYZ
.sp
.ps 16
.vs (\n(.s+2)p
.fp 5 SHOWBOAT
.ft R
To use it for the first letter of a paragraph, it will look like:
.sp 50p
\s(48\f5H\s0\fRere is the first sentence of a paragraph that uses the
showboat font as its first letter.
Additional vertical space must be used to allow room for the larger
letter.
EOF
bash$ groff -Tps example.t >example.ps
# To use ghostscript/ghostview
bash$ ghostview example.ps
# To print it
bash$ lpr -Ppostscript example.ps
</verb></tscreen>
<p>
References: <tt>/usr/src/gnu/usr.bin/groff/afmtodit/afmtodit.man</tt>, <em/groff_font/(1),
<em/groff_char/(1), <em/pfbtops/(1)
<sect>Can TrueType fonts be used?
<p>
The TrueType font format is used by Windows, Windows 95, Mac's,... It is
quite popular and there are a great number of fonts available in this format.
Unfortunately, there are only two applications that I am aware of that can
use this format: Ghostscript and povray. Ghostscript's support, according
to the documentation, is rudimentary and the results are likely to be inferior
to type 1 fonts.
<p>
However, groff would need a font description file, and I know of no tools
to construct the metrics from a TrueType font. In addition, the font would
have to be down loaded to postscript printers in the appropriate format,
and again, groff cannot handle TrueType fonts in this fashion.
<p>
X11 has no support for TrueType fonts that I am aware of.
<p>
The only program that I know of that has the ability to use TrueType fonts
is povray version 3, but I rather doubt many people will be creating documents
as a series of raytraced pages! :-)
<sect>Where can additional fonts be obtained?
<p>
Many fonts are available on the Internet. They are either entirely
free, or are share-ware. In addition, there are many inexpensive CDROMs
available that contain many fonts. Some Internet locations (as of August
1996) are:
<tscreen><verb>
ftp://ftp.winsite.com (Formerly CICA)
http://www.simtel.net/simcgi-bin/dosfind.cgi
ftp://ftp.coast.net/
http://af-pc-plloyd.ecel.uwa.edu.au/fonts/index.html
http://www.esselte.com/letraset/index.html
http://www.inil.com/users/elfring/esf.htm
</verb></tscreen>
<sect>Additional questions
<p>
<itemize>
<item>What use are the <em/.pfm/ files?
<item>Can one generate the <em/.afm/ file from a <em/.pfa/ or <em/.pfb/?
<item>How to generate the groff character mapping files for postscript fonts
with non-standard character names?
<item>Can xditview and devX?? devices be setup to access all the new fonts?
<item>It would be good to have examples of using TrueType fonts with povray and
ghostscript.
</itemize>
</article>
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