why not source typeface glyphs on demand from the host os (op tionally!)

Peter Crowther peter.crowther at networkinference.com
Mon Feb 18 12:09:35 UTC 2002


> From: Mark Mullin [mailto:mark at vibrant3d.com] 
> CAN SOMEONE PROVE OR DISPROVE THAT FOR 
> ANY FONT f ON ANY
> PLATFORM p, the FORM g REPRESENTING A 
> CHARACTER c WITH
> PROPERTIES SPECIFIED BY p IS
> CONSTANT?  If a Rose were a glyph is a 
> rose(windows)
> is a rose(mac) is a rose(bsd) ????

I can disprove it.  Consider a TrueType font that contains hinting.  On a
Windows platform, that hinting will be used (check out Verdana, for example,
for a remarkably readable browser font).  On a FreeType system that takes
care to *ignore* the hinting to avoid patent infringement, it is almost
certain that one or more of the glyphs will be different --- otherwise the
hinting would be redundant!

The situation is more difficult for fonts without hinting, but my guess is
that FreeType and TrueType will make different decisions under certain
circumstances.

This is why I like writing Web applications that *don't* have precise pixel
placement requirements, as you can let the browser worry about text sizing
and placement :-).

		- Peter



More information about the Squeak-dev mailing list