Re: Problems building the unifont PFA and DIT files for the PDF book

[Alejandro Colomar <alx@kernel.org>]

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Hi Deri,

On Sun, Apr 21, 2024 at 08:58:03PM +0100, Deri wrote:
> This is one of Branden's changes to groff. Previously a missing spacewidth parameter was 
> ignored and groff would calculate a value. As far as I know noone has ever complained 
> about the typography groff produced when using a font with no spacewidth parameter, it 
> is now an error, but it does not stop it computing a value and continuing. For pdf and ps, 
> using the default DESC files for the devices, the computed value is 333.
> 
> However, UnifontM is a bit mapped mono font where all western glyphs have a width of 
> 500, so it would make sense edit that value into the UnifontM file by hand. For other 
> language glyphs the fixed width is 1000 but they don't normally need a space character 
> between glyphs, but you can adjust with .ss if necessary.
> 
> I would advise to use:-
> 
> .special TINOR UnifontM S

Yep, I used that order, following the patch you sent me a few weeks ago.

BTW, why do you call it TINOR and not TinosR?  Also, why UnifontM and
not UnifontR?  What's that M mean?

> Since this is the order you would like the fonts searched, typographically TINOR is much 
> better than UnifontM because the glyphs are drawn not bit mapped, so if a glyph exists in 
> both prefer to use TINOR.

Yep.

> If you want to produce man pages in CJK languages, it would be much better to install a 
> proper CJK font rather than rely on UnifontM, I suggested to use it to fill the gaps in the 
> iso-8859 pages. Now you want complete pages in other languages for shadow, you 
> should consider installing an appropriate font. I have attached two pdfs, one using 
> UnifontM and the other a proper CJK font. If you use your pdf viewers zoom control you 
> will soon see the difference in quality.

Yeah, I was looking for a font that's in a common Debian package.  I
found some, but they were in very obscure packages that I prefer not to
depend on.  I'll keep searching.

Have a lovely night!
Alex

> Cheers 
> 
> Deri

-- 
<https://www.alejandro-colomar.es/>

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