🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <411@wjh12.harvard.edu>, I asked for information about
outlines font editors for an MS-DOS environment (PostScript or
otherwise).  I said:

>  The minimum requirement for such an editor is that it enable
>me to draw new outline characters and modify existing outlines
>to make new characters.

Additionally, the editor had to have the ability to incorporate
"hints" to insure that characters at all sizes would be formed as
cleanly as Adobe PostScript fonts.

  Nobody wrote to correct my understanding of the limitation of
ZSoft's Publisher's Typefoundry.  I did mention that I was willing
to design outlines on a MacIntosh or elsewhere, if necessary.  One
person wrote in praise of Fontographer 3.0:
________________________________________________________________
It is a complete redesign of version 2.0.  It has a much 
cleaner user interface to it.  You can read in bitmaps in various
standard Macintosh formats and have Fontographer do an excellent
job of autotracing the bitmaps to produce outlines.  Fontographer
will of course output bitmap fonts at any desired size in the
normal range (4 pt to 127 pt if I recall correctly).  Fontographer
uses Nimbus Q hinting technology to assure legible type at small
sizes.  The documentation suggests that this works by checking the
letter form for near horizontal and near vertical strokes of identical
weight and performing device pixel rounding to ensure that they retain
identical weight on output.

However, it is true that Fontographer does not yet parse Adobe Type 1
fonts (although no doubt a future release will, once Adobe releases
its Type 1 format next year) and that it uses its own PostScript routines
to create Adobe Type 3 fonts.
____________________________________________________________________

  This evaluation was confirmed by another reader.  I telephoned Altsys,
the manufacturer of Fontographer (214-424-4888); they confirmed all the
details above, emphasizing that their fonts would work on any PostScript
device whatsoever, except for the lack of support for ATM, which is unique
to genuine Adobe fonts.  They said that the rumor that Adobe would release
the details for type 1 fonts is still a rumor and nothing has been
released yet, but they will certainly look into type 1 if the details
become available.

  All in all, this seems like the best product.  Given the company's
general but good-natured scorn for MS-DOS ("We think that IBM stands for
'I bought MacIntosh.'"), it is unlikely that Fontographer will be re-
leased in an MS-DOS format, although we can hope this will change as
GUIs for MS-DOS become better established.

  Meanwhile, another reader mentioned a font editor for Sun systems:

Typographics, Ltd., 46 Hehalutz St., Jerusalem 96222, Israel,
972-2-537819, Jakob Gonczarowski, contact.  

  John Koontz offered the following additional information:

In regard to filters, The Font Center, 509 Marin St., 121, Thousand
Oaks, CA  91360 (805) 373-1919 has a font system which involves a 
proprietary bitmap format .PMF.  They sell filters from TeX pixel
file format (.PXL in their usage, at least) to .PMF, and also back and
forth between .PMF and LaserJet format (.LJP in their usage) or Windows
format (Windows .FNT).  I don't know how much polishing is needed.

For reviews of ZSoft's PTF, see Personal Publishing (Aug 1988) 4.7:40-52
(reviews Vers. 1.1); PC World (Jul 1988) ?.?:161-162 (reviews 1.02).

  Thanks to everyone who responded.  I tried to reply personally by mail,
but a global thanks to anyone whose mail went astray.

--David
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David J. Birnbaum           djb@wjh12.harvard.edu [Internet]
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