Re: [Freetype] what is the best format for fonts storage/distribution?

[Vadim Plessky]

On Tuesday 20 August 2002 2:06 pm, Vadim Plessky wrote:
|  Hello PfaEdit developers & FreeType users,
|
|  I'd like to ask you a question:
|   * what is the best format for fonts storage/distribution? *
|
|  NOTE that I am speaking here about *storage and/or distribution*, not
| about *rendering quality* (thoughs those topics are related, I'd like to
| discuss just subj. for now)

I have found rather interesting opinion on subject at:

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
The raster tragedy at low resolution 
http://www.microsoft.com/typography/tools/trtalr.htm

Excerpts from the presentation at the training session on 29 October 1997 
(updated in March 1998) given by Beat Stamm, lead developer of Visual 
TrueType. 
...
Summa summarum: 
The main difference between Type 1 and TrueType is: 

* A lot of situations you need not worry about in Type 1
* A lot of situations you can't do anything about in Type 1

Which of the two should you put into an OpenType font? This depends on what 
you'll use it for. 

* Mainly for printing? Don't bother with converting Type 1 outlines into 
TrueType outlines. This can at best introduce conversion errors.
* Mainly for display and online viewing? Go for the highest quality hinted 
TrueType outlines and all the deltas you can afford.
* Both printing and display? Use both, or at least clean up the TrueType 
outlines after conversion.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

while article is devoted to *rendering* and *rendering quality*, final 
conclusion is ... what outlines you should put into your (OpenType) font.

(reasoning) Sounds interesting, isn't it?

BTW: you may want to look at
http://www.myfonts.com/Person847.html 
- this is page with some info about Beat Stamm, author of article quoted 
above.

"Swiss expert in type technology, working in the Microsoft Typography Group. 
He developed Visual TrueType, the most powerful software for hinting TrueType 
fonts, basing it on Sampo Kaasila's TypeMan software, which Microsoft 
licensed. He now works on ClearType."

http://www.myfonts.com/Person74.html
Sampo Kaasila

"Expert on font rendering, having been lead engineer for the TrueType 
rasterizer while at Apple, from 1987 to 1989. He set up his own company, Type 
Solutions, to market font development software (TypeMan, StingRay, 
Incubator), a Java development system, software for the Apple Newton and, 
later, a new rasterizer, T2K. This relied much less on hints in the font, yet 
produced results comparable with good TrueType fonts.
In 1998 Bitstream acquired Type Solutions and T2K is now fully integrated into 
Bitstream's font rasterizer, now called Font Fusion."

It seems to me MS acquired most of its TrueType font technologies.
I had impression before than most of TT technology has been developed in-house 
(Apple+Microsoft)...

[...]
|
|  I'd like to understand reasoning for those decisions, your help / advise
| is highly appreciated!
|
|  I found that OpenType fonts generated by PfaEdit are rendered quite well
| by FreeType (tested Linux+XFree86+KDE, AA enabled), though not so good as
| generated PFB (PS Type1) fonts (P.S.: hinting is done in PostScript model,
| hand-tuned after auto-hinting).
|  But as nowone (from major commercial font vendors) ships OpenType fonts -
| I have impressins that there is something wrong with OpenType.
|  Or I miss something here?
|
|  Thanks you very much in advance for your help!

-- 

Vadim Plessky
http://kde2.newmail.ru  (English)
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