Fwd: TTF/OTF packaging thoughts?

Vasile Gaburici vgaburici at gmail.com
Thu Jul 24 08:51:29 UTC 2008


---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Vasile Gaburici <vgaburici at gmail.com>
Date: Thu, Jul 24, 2008 at 11:51 AM
Subject: Re: TTF/OTF packaging thoughts?
To: Nicolas Mailhot <nicolas.mailhot at laposte.net>

I agree with all your points. Regarding point 7, I'm going to
emphasize, as you did previously, that conversion from Type 1 to
OpenType/CFF is a non-trivial job, as the recent thread on the
OpenType versions of the URW fonts has shown. So, until someone finds
the significant time required to do a proper conversion, we should try
to make the type-1 fonts that Fedora does ship as usable as possible
*in Fedora*.

Currently I can use the URW Type 1 fonts that Fedora ships for
[Unicode 3.0+ encoded] Romanian *in Windows*, but not in Fedora. I'm
still investigating the best way to emulate Uniscribe's solution. The
issue that URW's fonts have is shared by most commercial Type 1 fonts
as well. Even if Fedora doesn't ship any of those, it would not hurt
to have them work in Fedora since they require the same hack that  URW
fonts do.

On Thu, Jul 24, 2008 at 11:31 AM, Nicolas Mailhot
<nicolas.mailhot at laposte.net> wrote:
> All,
>
> After the discussion on two public lists, and some public and private
> exchanges on IRC with people whose opinion I respect a lot, since no
> one proposed a problem-free way to do dual format packaging, and many
> objected to all this complexity just to work around OpenOffice.org
> bugs, I propose the following simplified policy.
>
> 1. If upstream works with one preferred OpenType format (TTF or OTF),
> use this format.
>
> 2. If a font is available in both TTF (OpenType TT) and OTF (OpenType
> CCF) formats, package the most recent and complete version.
>
> 3. If both formats are generated from the same source upstream,
> package the OTF (OpenType CCF) version. The reason is most font
> editors work with cubic splines natively, and we don't ignore CFF
> hinting the way we do TT hinting (different legal context), so the OTF
> version may be slightly better in our context.
>
> 4. For already packaged fonts, continue to package the TTF (OpenType
> TT) format till OO.o is fixed. The reason is to avoid upsetting users
> that already created documents using the TTF version, that won't work
> anymore if we switch to OTF under their feet. After OO.o is fixed
> apply the same policy as for new packages.
>
> 5. As an exception, a maintainer is allowed to use his best judgement
> and package both versions in a single rpm, if a user manages to
> convince him it's not a terribly bad idea. (but never do it by
> default). Bear in mind that in addition to the previously mentioned
> problems that will double the package size so livecd and
> bandwidth-constrained users won't be happy about it. But at least the
> packaging will be simple.
>
> 6. Since it seems several projects use different font names for the
> OTF and TTF variants, systematically package a fontconfig ruleset that
> maps the font name we do not package to the one we do.
>
> Is everyone happy with this? If you have a convincing argument to do
> something else please speak up now. Otherwise I'll add these rules to
> the wiki before the end of the week (and the start of my vacations),
> and probably send them FPC/FESCO side so they can be officialized.
>
> Also I propose:
>
> 7. Do not package new Type1 fonts. If someone cares about a Type1
> font, he should get it converted to OpenType CFF before we consider
> packaging it. (though it seems Type1 is moribund enough no one has
> proposed new Type1 fonts in ages)
>
> Regards,
>
> --
> Nicolas Mailhot
>
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