Re: [Savannah-hackers] savannah.gnu.org: submission of Free UCS Scalable Fonts

[Loic Dachary]

        Hi,

        Unless I'm mistaken your package is not (yet ;-) part of the GNU
project. Could you please submit it again with a different name so that people
are not confused ? 

        Thanks in advance,

address@hidden writes:
 > 
 > A package was submitted to savannah.gnu.org.
 > This mail was sent to address@hidden, address@hidden
 > 
 > 
 > Primoz Peterlin <address@hidden> described the package as follows:
 > License: gpl
 > Other License: 
 > Package: Free UCS Scalable Fonts
 > System name: gnufont
 > This package wants to apply for inclusion in the GNU project
 > 
 > Summary: The aim of this project is to develop a set of high-quality 
 > scalable (OpenType/TrueType...) fonts covering the ISO 10646/Unicode UCS 
 > (Universal Character Set).
 > 
 > Why do we need free scalable UCS fonts?
 > 
 > An increasing number of free software users is switching from free X11
 > bitmapped fonts to proprietary Microsoft Truetype fonts, as a) they
 > can be freely downloaded from Microsoft Typography page
 > <http://www.microsoft.com/typography/free.htm>, b) they contain a more
 > or less decent subsed of the ISO 10646 UCS (Universal Character Set),
 > c) they are high-quality, well hinted scalable Truetype fonts, and d)
 > Freetype <http://www.freetype.org/>, a free high-quality Truetype font
 > renderer exists and has been integrated into the latest release of
 > XFree86, the free X11 server.
 > 
 > Building a dependence on non-free software, even a niche one like
 > fonts, is dangerous. Microsoft Truetype core fonts are not free, they
 > are just costless. For now, at least. Citing the TrueType core fonts
 > for the Web FAQ <http://www.microsoft.com/typography/faq/faq8.htm>:
 > \"You may only redistribute the fonts in their original form (.exe or
 > .sit.hqx) and with their original file name from your Web site or
 > intranet site. You must not supply the fonts, or any derivative fonts
 > based on them, in any form that adds value to commercial products,
 > such as CD-ROM or disk based multimedia programs, application software
 > or utilities.\"
 > 
 > Aren\'t there any free high-quality scalable fonts? Yes, there are.
 > URW++, a German digital typefoundry, released their own version of the
 > 35 Postscript Type 1 core fonts under GPL as their donation to the
 > Ghostscript project <http://www.gimp.org/fonts.html>. The Wadalab
 > Kanji comittee has produced Type 1 font files with thousands of
 > filigree Japanese glyphs <ftp://ftp.ipl.t.u-tokyo.ac.jp/pub/Font/>.
 > Yannis Haralambous has drawn beautiful glyphs for the Omega
 > typesetting system <http://omega.cse.unsw.edu.au:8080/>. And so
 > on. Scattered around the internet there are numerous other free
 > resources for other national scripts, many of them aiming to be a
 > suitable match for Latin fonts like Times or Helvetica. 
 > 
 > What do we plan to achieve, and how?
 > 
 > Our aim is to collect available resources, fill in the missing pieces,
 > and provide a set of free high-quality scalable (Type 1 and Truetype)
 > UCS fonts, released under GPL.
 > 
 > Free UCS scalable fonts will cover the following character sets
 > 
 > * ISO 8859 parts 1-15
 > * CEN MES-3 European Unicode Subset
 >   http://www.evertype.com/standards/iso10646/pdf/cwa13873.pdf
 > * IBM/Microsoft code pages 437, 850, 852, 1250, 1252 and more
 > * Microsoft/Adobe Windows Glyph List 4 (WGL4)
 >  http://partners.adobe.com/asn/developer/opentype/appendices/wgl4.html
 > * KOI8-R and KOI8-RU
 > * DEC VT100 graphics symbols
 > * International Phonetic Alphabet
 > * Arabic, Hebrew, Armenian, Georgian, Ethiopian, Thai and Lao alphabets,
 >   including Arabic presentation forms A/B
 > * Japanese Katakana and Hiragana
 > * mathematical symbols, including the whole TeX repertoire of symbols
 > * APL symbols
 >   etc.
 > 
 > As historical style terms like renaissance or baroque letterforms
 > cannot be applied beyond Latin/Cyrillic/Greek scripts, a smaller
 > subset of styles will be made: one monospaced and two proportional
 > (one with and one without serifs) will be made at the start.
 > 
 > A free Postscript font editor, George Williams\'s Pfaedit
 > <http://pfaedit.sourceforge.net/> will be used for creating new
 > glyphs.
 > 
 > In the beginning, however, we don\'t believe that Truetype hinting will
 > be good enough to compete with neither the hand-crafted bitmapped
 > fonts at small sizes, nor with commercial TrueType fonts. A companion
 > program for modifying the TrueType font tables, TtfMod, is in the
 > works, though: <http://pfaedit.sourceforge.net/TtfMod/>. For
 > applications like xterm, users are referred to the existing UCS bitmap
 > fonts, <http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~mgk25/ucs-fonts.html>.
 > 
 > 
 > What do the file suffices mean?
 > 
 > The files with .sfd (Spline Font Database) are in PfaEdit\'s native
 > format. Please use these if you plan to modify the font files. PfaEdit
 > can export these to mostly any existing font file format.
 > 
 > TrueType fonts for immediate consumption are the files with the .ttf
 > (TrueType Font) suffix. You can use them directly, e.g. with the X
 > font server.
 > 
 > The files with .ps (PostScript) suffix are not font files at all -
 > they are merely PostScript files with glyph tables, which can be used
 > for overview, which glyphs are contained in which font file.
 > 
 > You may have noticed the lacking of PostScript Type 1 (.pfa/.pfb) font
 > files. Type 1 format does not support large (> 256) encoding vectors,
 > so they can not be used with ISO 10646 encoding. If your printer
 > supports it, you can use Type 0 format, though. Please use PfaEdit for
 > conversion to Type 0.
 > 
 > 
 > Primoz Peterlin, <address@hidden>
 > 
 > Free UCS scalable fonts: ftp://biofiz.mf.uni-lj.si/pub/fonts/elbrus/
 > 

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