Extensions to \font syntax ?
Dear Thanh / PdfTeX team -- Has any consideration ever been given to the idea of extending the syntax of TeX's \font command within the context (small "c") of PdfTeX ? What I have in mind are the following : \font \cmex = cmex10 rotated <angle> \font \cmex = cmex10 translated <matrix> I ask because I am currently typesetting a letter requiring characters from a number of different languages, and I can successfully synthesise 99% of the characters I need from the basic CM family. However, I am stuck at o-horn and u-horn (Vietnamese). I can get reasonably close by scaling and positioning "3B or "7D from CMEX<whatever>, but I would like to get even closer, and being able to rotate the font (and perhaps transform it) would take me from "reasonably close" to "d@mn nigh perfect" :-) ** Phil.
Philip TAYLOR (Ret'd) writes:
Dear Thanh / PdfTeX team --
Has any consideration ever been given to the idea of extending the syntax of TeX's \font command within the context (small "c") of PdfTeX ?
What I have in mind are the following :
\font \cmex = cmex10 rotated <angle> \font \cmex = cmex10 translated <matrix>
Hi Phil, I like such a feature too. But there are some technical problems. Type 1 fonts have a font matrix which can be altered when a font is loaded. It's quite easy to change the matrix in order to slant, rotate, ... a font. But pdftex also supports TrueType fonts which are lacking a font matrix. It doesn't mean that pdftex isn't able to do what you propose, but it's nontrivial. It has to alter the so-called PDF text matrix. But this sounds easier than it is. I made a similar suggestion a few years ago. I modified the text matrix of a PDF file in order to slant an upright font and posted the resulting PDF file to the mailing list. I asked whether pdftex can't do something similar. I got a response from Mark Wicks, the author of dvipdfm. He said: "Your example is too simple." He had been right, things turned out to be much more difficult than I expected. And changing the matrix isn't sufficient. You'll certainly have to adapt the .tfm files. All this doesn't look like a weekend project. Regards, Reinhard -- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Reinhard Kotucha Phone: +49-511-3373112 Marschnerstr. 25 D-30167 Hannover mailto:reinhard.kotucha@web.de ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Microsoft isn't the answer. Microsoft is the question, and the answer is NO. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
participants (2)
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Philip TAYLOR (Ret'd) -
Reinhard Kotucha