[Groff] Re: Adding (math) fonts to groff

[Werner LEMBERG]

> Makefile patch attached. I leave commenting to you, since I do not
> have a clear idea of what coment you want.

Thanks, will add it soon, I hope.

> One problem is that the generation of symbolsl.afm depends on
> pfa/pfb file being available and on ghostscript being installed.

This isn't a problem.  We provide the default version, and whoever
wants to change that has to use a new font and metrics file.

> The other one is that the use of Adobe fonts seems to be assumed.
> Are the changes to make the font creation more easyly adjusted to
> URW fonts desired?  Or for URW fonts a better solution is a separate
> Makefile?

Honestly, I haven't investigated this issue.  Since font description
files for the URW fonts should go into a separate, add-on package, a
new Makefile is probably the simplest solution.

> If we go into business of creating packages for URW fonts -
> are they to be made as replacements of default groff fonts
> or as sets of aditional font (i.e. what names to use TR or UTR)?
> 
> Is it possible (and easy) for a document author to switch from a set
> of Adobe font descriptions (TR, SS, S etc.) to URW (UTR, USS, US
> etc.) if both are installed?

Yes, please have a look at ec.tmac to see my solution I've done for
the TeX EC font family -- all fonts get a `EC' postfix (not prefix),
and family switching works as before.  The trick is to call .ftr first
and then .sty again.

> devps/Makefile.sub calls devps/generate/Makefile in the following
> way
> 
>          $(MAKE) -f $(srcdir)/generate/Makefile \
>            srcdir=$(srcdir)/generate DESC=$(srcdir)/DESC.in
> 
> But it seems that the srcdir and DESC variables provided to
> generate/Makefile on the command line are ignored.
> 
> Result of some changes half-commited?

I can't remember.  Maybe some preparations for further changes.
Currently, you have to be in srcdir to run generate/Makefile -- I
don't see much value to change that because this is nothing a normal
user will execute.  Well, it's not bad to add support for $(srcdir)
but there are probably more important things to do...


    Werner