Hi Branden, On Thu, Apr 18, 2024 at 02:03:50PM -0500, G. Branden Robinson wrote: > Hi Alex, > > At 2024-04-18T18:00:09+0200, Alejandro Colomar wrote: > > Hi, > > > > I find the following section very opaque. > > > > Font installation > > The following is a step‐by‐step font installation guide for > > gropdf. > > > > • Convert your font to something groff understands. This is a > > PostScript Type 1 font in PFA or PFB format, together with an > > AFM file. A PFA file begins as follows. > > %!PS-AdobeFont-1.0: > > A PFB file contains this string as well, preceded by some non‐ > > printing bytes. In the following steps, we will consider the > > use of CTAN’s BrushScriptX‐Italic font in PFA format. > > > > This mention of an AFM file is the first mention in the page, and has > > no information about it at all. > > It's background that experienced users of PostScript Type 1 fonts would > be expected to have. This is one of those situations where the > oft-repeated principle "man pages are a reference, not a tutorial" > frustrates people.
Indeed. > As a system, groff cares nothing for PFA, PFB, or > AFM files except insofar as it needs to prepare PostScript or PDF > output. > > Here is some foundational material from groff(7). I wrote this shortly > before the groff 1.23.0 release. > > Using fonts > In digital typography, a font is a collection of characters in a > specific typeface that a device can render as glyphs at a desired > size. (Terminals and some typesetters have fonts that render at > only one or two sizes. As examples, take the groff lj4 device’s > Lineprinter, and lbp’s Courier and Elite faces.) A roff formatter > can change typefaces at any point in the text. The basic faces are > a set of styles combining upright and slanted shapes with normal > and heavy stroke weights: “R”, “I”, “B”, and “BI”—these stand for > roman, bold, italic, and bold‐italic. For linguistic text, GNU > troff groups typefaces into families containing each of these > styles. (Font designers prepare families such that the styles > share esthetic properties.) A text font is thus often a family > combined with a style, but it need not be: consider the ps and pdf > devices’ ZCMI (Zapf Chancery Medium italic)—often, no other style > of Zapf Chancery Medium is provided. On typesetters, at least one > special font is available, comprising unstyled glyphs for > mathematical operators and other purposes. > > Like the AT&T troff formatter, GNU troff does not itself load or > manipulate a digital font file; instead it works with a font > description file that characterizes it, including its glyph > repertoire and the metrics (dimensions) of each glyph. This > information permits the formatter to accurately place glyphs with > respect to each other. Before using a font description, the > formatter associates it with a mounting position, a place in an > ordered list of available typefaces. So that a document need not > be strongly coupled to a specific font family, in GNU troff an > output device can associate a style in the abstract sense with a > mounting position. Thus the default family can be combined with a > style dynamically, producing a resolved font name. A user‐ > specified font name that combines family and style (or refers to a > font that is not a member of a family) is already “resolved”. > > Fonts often have trademarked names, and even Free Software fonts > can require renaming upon modification. groff maintains a > convention that a device’s serif font family is given the name T > (“Times”), its sans‐serif family H (“Helvetica”), and its > monospaced family C (“Courier”). Historical inertia has driven > groff’s font identifiers to short uppercase abbreviations of font > names, as with TR, TB, TI, TBI, and a special font S. > > The default family used with abstract styles can be changed at any > time; initially, it is T. Typically, abstract styles are arranged > in the first four mounting positions in the order shown above. The > default mounting position, and therefore style, is always 1 (R). > By issuing appropriate formatter instructions, you can override > these defaults before your document writes its first glyph. > > Terminals cannot change font families and lack special fonts. They > support style changes by overstriking, or by altering ISO 6429/ > ECMA‐48 graphic renditions (character cell attributes). > > The ft request and \f escape sequence select a typeface by name, > abstract style, or mounting position. The fam request and \F > escape sequence set the default font family. The ftr request > translates one font name to another; fzoom magnifies a resolved > one. sty and fp associate abstract styles and font names with > mounting positions. > > Of course if you read that in your terminal emulator, you'll enjoy the > benefit of bold and italic faces to set literals and instances of jargon > into relief. > > > Nope. Can you please explain what I need to do to generate a TINOR > > file (or TinosR, or whatever it's called; I'm confused by the naming > > inconsistency) > > Font description file names in groff are like file extensions in Unix > file names; they can look however you like, but following certain > conventions makes things more convenient. I believe this point is > covered in the quoted material above. While the above is interesting, I've already read similar explanations from you in related threads. However, I still have no clue of how to drop TINOR from the Linux man-pages repo and generate it from something coming from a package. :( Cheers, Alex > > Regards, > Branden -- <https://www.alejandro-colomar.es/>
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