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Path: senator-bedfellow.mit.edu!enterpoop.mit.edu!usc!howland.reston.ans.net!noc.near.net!nic.umass.edu!ymir.cs.umass.edu!ymir.cs.umass.edu!usenet From: walsh@cs.umass.edu (Norman Walsh) Newsgroups: comp.fonts,comp.answers,news.answers Subject: comp.fonts FAQ.1C.General-Info (3/3) Followup-To: poster Date: 21 Jun 1993 13:19:09 GMT Organization: Dept of Comp and Info Sci, Univ of Mass (Amherst) Lines: 1211 Approved: news-answers-request@MIT.Edu Distribution: world Expires: 21 Jul 93 09:21:06 GMT Message-ID: <fonts-faq-3-740668866@cs.umass.edu> References: <fonts-faq-1-740668866@cs.umass.edu> Reply-To: walsh@cs.umass.edu (Norman Walsh) NNTP-Posting-Host: ibis.cs.umass.edu Summary: This posting answers frequently asked questions about fonts. It addresses both general font questions and questions that are specific to a particular platform. Xref: senator-bedfellow.mit.edu comp.fonts:9141 comp.answers:1069 news.answers:9618 Posted-By: auto-faq 2.4 Archive-name: fonts-faq/part3 Version: 1.4.1 This very intresting book looks at the history of letter shapes as well font design. The Mac is Not a Typewriter, Robin Williams, Peachpit Press. A good, clear explanation of what typography is, and how to get it from your computer. Mac-specific, but full of excellent general advice. I think there's also a PC version. Available at most computer bookstores Rhyme and Reason: A Typographic Novel, Erik Spiekermann, H. Berthold AG, ISBN 3-9800722-5-8. Printing Types (2 vols), Daniel Berkely Updike, Dover Press. Affordable edition of the most readable history of type, lots of illustrations. Notes: Both the Dover and Harvard U. P. editions where 2 volumes. The Dover editions were paperback and the Harvard hardback. It appears that the Dover edition is out of print. Collectible HUP editions are not cheap although later HUP editions may be had. Most libraries have later HUP and Dover editions. If someone knows of a source, please pass it along. The Art of Hand Lettering, Helm Wotzkow, Dover Press, reprint from 1952. Looking Good In Print, Roger C. Parker, Ventana Press, ISBN: 0-940087-32-4. Well, as a beginner's book, [ it ] isn't bad. I can't say that I agree with the author's tastes all the time, but he at least gives some good examples. Also there are some nice _Publish_-style makeovers. Don Hosek <dhosek@ymir.claremont.edu> Book Design: A Practical Introduction, Douglas Martin, Van Nostrand Reinhold, New York: 1989. 206pp. Along with Jan White's book (see below), this provides a fairly complete guide to book design. Martin's book is somewhat more conservative in outlook and also reflects his UK background. Don Hosek <dhosek@ymir.claremont.edu> Digital Typography: An Introduction to Type and Composition for Computer System Design, Richard Rubinstein, Addison-Wesley, Reading, Massachusetts: 1988. 340pp. An interesting, technological approach to typography which is worth reading although not necessarily always worth believing. A not insubstantial portion of the text is dedicated to representing type on a CRT display and Rubinstein devotes some time to expressing characteristics of typography numerically. Don Hosek <dhosek@ymir.claremont.edu> Graphic Design for the Electronic Age, Jan V. White, Watson-Guptill Publications, New York: 1988. 212pp. A good handbook for document design. In a well-organized approach, White covers the principles for laying out most of the typographics features of a technical document. White is a bit overeager to embrace sans-serif types and in places his layout ideas seem a bit garish, but it's still a quite worthwhile book. Don Hosek <dhosek@ymir.claremont.edu> Xerox Publishing Standards: A Manual of Style and Design, Watson-Guptill Publications, New York: 1988. 400pp. Overall, a disappointing book. It is divided into four sections of widely varying intent: ``Publishing Process,'' ``Document Organization,'' ``Writing and Style'' and ``Visual Design.'' None of them is really adequate for the task and all are highly centered on the Xerox method for publishing. As a guide to Xerox' process, it succeeds, but as a manual for general use, it falls far short. In print. Don Hosek <dhosek@ymir.claremont.edu> Methods of Book Design (3rd edition), Hugh Williamson, Yale University Press, New Haven: 1983. 408pp. It is a bit out-of-date as regards technology, but on issues relating purely to design it is comprehensive and definitive. Well, I suppose it could be argued that printing technology influences design -- e.g. some types look fine in metal but lousy in digital imagesetting -- and therefore a book that is out-of-date in technology can't really be ``definitive'' in matters of design either. In any event, _Methods_ is more than adequate for a beginner's needs. My paper-bound copy (ISBN 0-300-03035-5) was $ 13.95; cheap at twice the price! Cameron Smith <cameron@symcom.math.uiuc.edu> The Thames & Hudson Manual of typography, Rauri McLean, Thames & Hudson An excellent book if you start getting more interested in type. Look for Rauri McLean's other books after this one... Liam R.E. Quin <lee@sq.com> Typography and Why it matters, Fernand Baudin. There is no better introduction than [ it ] . It's not a primer on subjects such as ``what does Avant Garde look like,'' or ``This is a good font for books.'' It is a good primer on the things you need to know before the rest should be considered. He's a lovely writer, to boot. [ My copy is at work, so I may have munged the title--look up Baudin in ``Books in Print'' and improvise :-) ] Ari Davidow <ari@netcom.com> Better Type, Betty Binns It's definitely not a lightweight beginner's introduction, but I've found [ it ] to be indispensable. It's a large-format hardcover, but you can find it remaindered for cheap if you look around. The book goes into great detail about how factors like line spacing, line length, point size, and design of typeface (evenness of stroke weight, x-height, etc.) affect readability. When you've gotten the basics out of the way and want to learn more about the fine nuances of type color, this book is an absolute must. David Mandl <dmandl@bilbo.shearson.com> Printing Types: An Introduction..., S. Lawson, (revised) 1990 I'd also recommend Alexander S. Lawson's books especially /Printing Types: An Intro.../ (revised), 1990, which includes electronic types now. Bill Ricker <wdr@world.std.com> Twentieth Century Type Designers, Sebastian Carter, 1987. Discusses adaptaters of old faces to machine caster and film/laser, as well as new works. Bill Ricker <wdr@world.std.com> Tally of Types, Stanley Morrison, Cambridge University Press. A keepsake for CUP on the Monotype fonts he'd acquired for them when he was Type Advisor to both Brit.Monotype & CUP (Cambridge University Press, Cambs.UK), which discusses his hindsight on some of the great revival fonts and some of the better new fonts. Bill Ricker <wdr@world.std.com> Chicago Manual of Style, University of Chicago Press, 1982; ISBN 0-226-10390-0. The chapter on Design and Typography is most directly relevant, but there are a lot of hints scattered all through the Chicago Manual on making your words more readable and your pages more attractive. Stan Brown <brown@ncoast.org> X Window System Administrator's Guide (O'Reilly X Window System Guides, volume 8), O'Reilly It gives advice about setting up fonts, etc. Liam Quin <lee@sq.com> How Bodoni intended his types to look Bodoni, Giambattista. Fregi e Majuscole Incise e Fuse de ... Bodoni, Harvard University Library (repr). Inexpensive collectible, reproduced as a keepsake by the Houghton Library at Harvard. [ wdr ] The Elements of Typographic Style, Robert Bringhurst, Hartley & Marks 0-88179-033-8 pbk $ 15, Z246.B74 1992 0-88179-110-5 cloth, $ 25. A typography for desktop publishers who want to absorb some style. Informed by the historical european tradition and the desktop advertising, tempered by oriental yin-yang and examples. A page-turner with repeat-read depth. The only book I've seen that discusses page proportions that admits there are more than three ways that describes how to find one that feels good for your page. [ wdr ] Hermann Zapf on the cover-blurb: ``All desktop typographers should study this book. ... I wish to see this book become the Typographers' Bible.'' Printing It, Clifford Burke, Ballantine, 0-345-02694-2. Manual for the hobby letterpress printer. [ wdr ] Twentieth Century Type Designers, Sebastian Carter, Taplinger, 1987. Discusses the talented adaptators of old faces to machine caster and film/laser, as well as the designers of new works. Indexed? [ wdr ] Design with Type, Carl Dair, University of Toronto Press, 0-8020-1426-7. In print again (or still?); the ISBN above may be stale. A great introduction to the issues of practicality and taste that confront the users of type. A prized possession. I only regret that the book does not include among the excerpts from his Westvaco pamphlets the Seven Don'ts of Typography. [ wdr ] Typography 6: The Annual of the Type Directors Club, Susan Davis, ed., Watson-Guptill, 0-8230-5540-x. Specimens of Type Faces in the U.S. G.P.O., John J. Deviny, director., US G.P.O. Practice of Typography: Plain Printing Types, Theodore Low De Vinne, Century Co./DeVinne Press. One of the earlier critical studies, in four volumes of which this is my personal favorite, and still a classic reference. If one wants to understand 18th and 19th century typography in context, this writer lived the transition from eclectic to standard sizes, and comments with taste. [ wdr ] An Essay on Typography, Eric Gill, Godine, 0-87923-762-7. The Alphabet and Elements of Lettering, Frederic W. Goudy, Dorset Press (Marboro Books), 0-88029-330-6 Lovely. A wonderful way to learn Goudy's taste. Stanley Morison Displayed, Herbert Jones, Frederick Muller Ltd / W, 0-584-10352-2. Lovely. A wonderful way to learn Morrison's taste. Printing Types: An Introduction..., Alexander S. Lawson et. al., Beacon 1971,?Godine? 1990; (2nd Ed includes electronic types now) ``Good introduction to comparisons of typefaces, with a detailed history and a key family or face of each general category. Denounces rigid indexes of type faces.'' [ wdr ] Anatomy of a Typeface, Alexander Lawson, Godine, 0-87923-333-8, Z250.L34 1990 Deep description of the authors' favorite exemplar and its influences and relatives in each type category. It follows, without explicating, the category system developed in the prior book. [ wdr ] Types of Typefacs and how to recognize them, J. Ben Lieberman, Sterling, 1968 ``This isn't very good really, but it does give lots of examples of the main categories.'' [ Liam ] [ Old bibliographies praised this one, but I haven't seen it so I can't comment.-- wdr ] Tally of Types ( & other titles), Stanley Morrison, Cambridge U. Press. A keepsake for CUP on the Monotype fonts he'd acquired for them when he was Type Advisor to both Brit. Monotype & CUP (Cambridge University Press, Cambs.UK), which discusses his hindsight on some of the great revival fonts and some of the better new fonts. [ wdr ] Rookledge's International Type Finder 2nd, Perfect, Christopher and Gordon Rookledge, Ed Moyer Bell Ltd / Rizzoli, 1-55921-052-4, Z250.P42 [ 1st Ed was NY: Beil 1983 ] ``Lg. trade pb. Indexed by stylistic & characteristic features. Shows A-Z, a-z, 0-9 in primary figures, whether lining or ranging. Particularly distinctive sorts are marked for ease of comparison. Separate tables collect the distinctive characters for assistance in identifying a sample.'' [ wdr ] English Printers' Ornaments, Henry R. Plomer, Burt Franklin Paragraphs on Printing, Bruce Rogers, [ Rudge ] Dover, 0-486-23817-2 Digital Typography: An Introduction to Type and Composition for Computer System Design, Richard Rubinstein, Addison-Wesley, Reading, Massachusetts: 1988. 340pp. For people who are disappointed with how the type looks on the laser, this book explains the subleties of that medium and of the screen that others miss. This is a study of the Human Factors of computer typographic systems. [ wdr ] The Case for Legibility, John Ryder, The Bodley Head, 0-370-30158-7, Z250.A4 The Solotype Catalog of 4,147 Display typefaces, Dan X. Solo, Dover, 0-486-27169-2, Z250.5.D57S654 19 ``Working catalog of a specialty Graphics Arts shop. They use proprietary optical special effects techniques to get Desktop Publishing effects, and more, without the laser-printer grain. Great listing of 19th Century Decorated Types -- probably the largest collection in the world. Prices to order headlines from them are NOT cheap however. Their services are for professional or serious hobby use only. Solo's previous Dover books show some number of complete alphabets of a general peculiar style; this one shows small fragments of his entire usable collection, important as an index. (According to private correspondence, they have more faces that have not yet been restored to usable condition.) Not well indexed, but indexed.'' [ wdr ] Stop Stealing Sheep & find out how type works, Erik Spiekermann & E.M. Ginger., Adobe Press, 1993 Introductory, motivational. If you wonder why there are so many type faces in the world, this is the book for you! [ Liam ] [ The title refers to the old joke: ``A man who would letterspace lowercase would also steal sheep.'' [ wdr ] ] The Art & Craft of Handmade Paper, Vance Studley, Dover, 0-486-26421-1, TS1109.S83 1990 Letters of Credit, Walter Tracey, Godine Press ``I can't recommend this too highly. It's not as introductory as the Sheep Book, but conveys a feeling of love and respect for the letter forms, and covers a lot of ground very, very well.'' [ Liam ] Printing Types: Their History, Forms & Use, Daniel Berkely Updike, Harvard University Press, reprint by Dover. The standard reference. Tour-de-force history of type and type-styles. A trifle conservative in its biases, but typography is conservative for good reason: readibility. Check the addenda for his final words on newer faces. [ wdr ] 1. I believe the Dover edition to be 3 vols Pbk; both the collectable and later Harvard U.P. editions were two vols hbk. 2. I am informed by my bookseller & Books In Print that the Dover edition is out of print. *sigh* If a source be known, let me know. Collectible HUP eds are not cheap, although later HUP eds may be had. Most libararies have later HUP or Dover eds. [ wdr ] Modern Encyclopedia of Typefaces, 1960-90, Lawrence W. Wallis, Van Nostrand Reinhold, 0-442-30809-4, Z250.W238 1990 ``Gives examples of most typefaces, almost all digital, designed & distributed in the last 30 years. Cross indexed by foundry and designer, and sources and looks-likes. Some historical bits. Shows full a-z,A-Z,0-9, a few points (punctuation); and 0-9 again if both lining and oldstyle supplied. Only complaint is that it omits small caps even from what few fonts have 'em and the accented characters, of which most have some but too few. List $ 25.'' [ wdr ] About Alphabets: Some Marginal Notes on Type Design, Hermann Zapf, MIT Press, 0-262-74003-6 Hermann Zapf & His Design Philosophy, Hermann Zapf, Society of Typographic Arts, Chicago ``Anything about, by, or vaguely connected with Hermann Zapf is probably worth reading several times :-)'' [ Liam ] Manuale Typographicum, Hermann Zapf, MIT Press, 0-262-74004-4 There are two books of this title (portrait and landscape); this is the only mass-market edition of either. Both are Zapf's selections of interesting typographical quotations in his inimitable display typography. [ wdr ] Microsoft Windows 3.1 Programmer's Reference, Microsoft Press. Documents the Panose system of typeface classification. Probably contains a general discussion of TrueType under MS Windows 3.1. Introduction to Typography, 3rd ed, Faber, London, 1962. A very good introduction for any beginner. Also discusses things like illustrations and cover design, although not in great detail. Simon was a purist, as the editor of the 3rd edition remarks. He did not mention phototypesetting in his original edition, but some observations on its uses and abuses have since been added. Anders Thulin <ath@linkoping.trab.se> [ ed: additional bibliographic information appears in the file ``Additional-bibliography'' on ibis.cs.umass.edu:/pub/norm/comp.fonts. I have not yet had time to integrate this bibliographic information into the FAQ ] Subject: 1.19. (En)Coding Standards Unicode Consortium; The Unicode Standard, volumes 1 and 2, Worldwide Character Encoding, Addison-Wesley Publishing Co. Unicode consortium e-mail address is: < unicode-inc@hq.m4.metaphor.com> To obtain more information on Unicode or to order their printed material and/or diskettes Steven A. Greenfield Unicode Office Manager 1965 Charleston Road Mountain View, CA 94043 Tel. 415-966-4189 Fax. 415-966-1637 Xerox Character Code Standard, Xerox Corp., Xerox Systems Institute, 475 Oakmead Parkway, Sunnyvale, CA 94086 Subject: 1.20. TrueType George Moore <georgem@microsoft.com> announces the following information regarding TrueType fonts: ``I am pleased to announce that there is now one central location for all official Microsoft TrueType information available on the Internet. The 9 files listed below are available for anonymous ftp access on ftp.uu.net (137.39.1.9) in the /vendor/microsoft/TrueType-Info directory. The most important of those files is the TrueType Font Files Specifications, a 400 page book which describes in excruciating detail how to build a TrueType font. Other information is also available in the same directory and other files will be added from time to time. For those people who do not have ftp access to the Internet can find the same information available for downloading on Compuserve in the Microsoft developer relations forum (GO MSDR) in the TrueType library. Please be aware that the TrueType specifications is a copyrighted work of Microsoft and Apple and can not be resold for profit. TrueType developer information files on ftp.uu.net: 1. ttspec1.zip, ttspec2.zip, and ttspec3.zip The TrueType Specification: These three compressed files contain the ``TrueType Font Files Specifications'', a 400 page book complete with illustrations which details how to construct a TrueType font from scratch (or build a tool to do so), the TrueType programming language, and the complete format of each sub-table contained in the .TTF file. These documents are stored in Word for Windows 2.0 format and require Windows 3.1 for printing. See the ``readme.doc'' (in ttspec1.zip) for printing instructions. Requires 2.5MB of disk space after uncompression. This manual is a superset of the similar specifications from Apple and has added information specific to Windows that is not present in the Apple version. 2. ttfdump.zip An MS-DOS executable which will dump the contents of a TrueType font out in a human-readable fashion. It allows you to dump the entire font, or just specific sub-tables. This tool, combined with the specifications above, allows very effective debugging or exploration of any TrueType font. For example, to dump the contents of the 'cmap' (character code to glyph index mapping) table, enter: ttfdump fontname.ttf -tcmap -nx Entering ``ttfdump'' with no options will give you a help message. 3. ttfname.zip Example C source code on how to parse the contents of a TrueType font. Although this particular example will open up the file and locate the font name contained within the 'name' table, it could be readily adapted to parse any other structure in the file. This compressed zip file also contains many useful include files which have pre-defined structures set up for the internal tables of a TrueType font file. This code may be useful for developers who wish to parse the TrueType data stream returned by the GetFontData() API in Windows 3.1. 4. tt-win.zip A 31 page Word for Windows 2.0 document which is targeted for the Windows developer who is interested in learning about some of the capabilities TrueType adds to Windows 3.1. Contains many illustrations. 5. embeddin.zip A text file which describes all of the information necessary for a Windows developer to add TrueType font embedding capabilities to their application. Font embedding allows the application to bundle the TrueType fonts that were used in that document and transport it to another platform where the document can be viewed or printed correctly. 6. tt-talk.zip The TrueType Technical Talks 1 and 2. These text files describe some of the things that are happening with TrueType behind the scenes in Windows 3.1. The first document walks the reader through all of the steps that occur from when the user first presses the key on the keyboard until that character appears on the screen (scaling, hinting, drop out control, caching and blitting). The second talk describes one of the unique features of TrueType called non-linear scaling which allows the font vendor to overcome some of the physical limitations of low resolution output devices. 7. lucida.zip This text file contains useful typographic information on the 22 Lucida fonts which are contained in the Microsoft TrueType Font Pack for Windows. It gives pointers on line-layout, mixing and matching fonts in the family and a little history on each typeface. This information was written by the font's designers, Chuck Bigelow & Kris Holmes.'' Subject: 1.21. Unicode Information [ ed: This is a summary of the Unicode info I've gleaned from the net recently, the whole Unicode issue needs to be addressed better by the FAQ...someday... someday...I'll get to reorganize the whole thing ] 1.21.1. Unicode Editing James Matthew Farrow contributes: I use `sam' for all by text editing. It is X editor based on an editor for the blit called jim. Papers describing sam as well as a distribution of sam itself are available for ftp from research.att.com. The sam there is a Unix port of the Plan 9 version. Plan 9 is a full unicode operating system, even around before NT! The libraries sam is built upon therefore support 16 bit wide characters. The graphics library, supplied with it at present does not. However they may be planning to distribute a new version which does soon. The library just plugs in replacing the library that comes with sam. No modification is necessary. Character are stored using the utf-2 encoding. All of the files I had before I started working with sam were 7 bit ascii so no conversion was needed. Now I have ditched xterm in favour of 9term: a terminal emulator in the style of 81/2 (the Plan 9 interface). This lets me type Unicode characters on the command line, as part of filenames, in mail, wherever and most Unix utilities cope without modification. This is about to be released. I'm looking for beta testers. ;-) Is a special keyboard required? No. ASCII Characters are typed as normal. Common characters above 0x7f are typed using two letter abbreviations. The table is similar to the troff special character codes, e.g, Alt-12 gives you a 1/2, Alt-'e gives you e acute, Alt-bu a bullet and so on. This table is hardwired into the library at present but is trivial to change. Other codes are accessed by typing their hex value, for instance the smiley is Alt-X263a (0x263a being a smiley character in the Unicode character set). Is roman-to-Unicode conversion available? All normal 7 bit ascii characters are encoded as themselves so no translation is needed. There are conversion routines in the library (runetochar and chartorune) which will do the conversion and it should be pretty simple to convert files already in another format. You would have to write something to do the transliteration yourself. A small patch to the system would let you enter different language `modes' for text entry. Subject: 1.22. Are there PostScript or TrueType fonts available? Apparently there is a version of the Lucida fonts by Bigelow and Holmes which support Unicode. This is the information I have on them. [ ed: quoting another source ] [ Windows NT ] will ship with a Unicode TrueType font containing approximately 1,500 characters. The font is called "Lucida Sans Unicode" and was specifically designed by Bigelow and Holmes for Microsoft to contain the following Unicode sets: ASCII Latin 1 European Latin Extended Latin Standard Phonetic Modifier Letters Generic Diacritical Greek Cyrillic Extended Cyrillic Hebrew Currency Symbols Letterlike Symbols Arrows Mathematical Operators Super & Subscript Form & Chart Components Blocks Geometric Shapes Miscellaneous Technical Miscellaneous Dingbats The bitmap fonts which comes with the utf version of the libXg graphics library (the library upon which sam is built) support a sparse subset of the full character set. That is, only a few of them have glyphs at present. A font editor such as xfedor would let you add more. The list of those currently available is pretty much as the above list. I use 9term and sam as a matter of course now and have for several months. I enjoy the convenience of putting special characters and accented characters in my mail as well as being able to do some phonetic work all in the one terminal/editor suite. Subject: 1.23. Can I Print Checks with the MICR Font? This comes up all the time: standard ordinary laser toner is magnetic and will be read by the banks. The gotcha is that standard laser toner rubs off in the *very* high-speed sorting equipment that are used, and this makes read rates drop low and the banks will hate you. I researched check printers for a customer, and was surprised to find this. The Troy(tm) printers he bought are basically stock Ricoh engines that have slightly tighther paper handling (for registration), plus they add a proprietary Teflon-type power coating on the output path to coat the checks. I saw some examples of checks printed with and without this special coating after running through something like 40 passes through check processing equipment, and the one without the coating was a mess. These require special handling that the banks do *not* like. Apparently, they go after companies that issue these kinds of checks with special processing fees. Subject: 1.24. Rules of Thumb It is difficult to set out guidelines for font usage, because almost any rule can be brilliantly broken under the right circumstances. * General guidelines: * Never lose track of the kind of work you're doing. An effect that would ruin a newsletter might be just the thing for a record cover. Know when you can safely sacrifice legibility for artistic effect. * Keep in mind the final reproduction process you'll be using. Some effects (like reversed type, white on black) can be hard to read off an ordinary 300-dpi laser, but will work if finals are done on a high-resolution printer, such as a Linotronic. Will the pages be photocopied? Offset? Onto rough paper, shiny paper? All these factors can and should influence your choice of fonts and how you use them. * Running some comparative tests is a good idea. Better to blow off a few sheets of laser paper now than to see a problem after thousands of copies are made. * No one can teach you font aesthetics; it must be learned by example. Look at beautiful magazines, posters, books with wide eyes, so that you can see how it's done. Examine ugly printed matter critically and consider why it's hard to read. * Good rules of thumb: * If you need a condensed font, find one that was designed that way, rather than scaling an existing font down to a percentage. Any scaling distorts a font's design; excessive scaling interferes with legibility - this goes for widening as well as narrowing. Extended faces do exist, although they aren't as common as condensed ones. * Many people feel that bold or italic type, or type in ALL CAPS, is more legible: ``This is the most important part of the newsletter, let's put it in bold.'' In fact, legibility studies show that such type is actually harder to read in bulk. Keep the text in a normal style and weight, and find another way to emphasize it - box it, illustrate it, run it in color, position it focally. * Too much reverse type - white on black - is hard on the eyes. It can be a nice effect if used sparingly. Don't reverse a serif font, though - its details will tend to fill in. Stick to reversing bold sans-serifs, and remember to space them out a bit more than usual. * It is always safest to use a plain serif font for large amounts of text. Because Times is widely used, it doesn't mean it should be avoided. Fonts like Palatino, Times, Century Old Style are deservedly popular because people can read a lot of text set in such faces without strain. Don't expect anyone to read extensive text set in a condensed font. * As point size gets bigger, track tighter, and (if the software allows) reduce the spacebands as well. A spaceband in a headline size (anything over 14 point) should be about as wide as a letter ``i''. * If you only have a few large headlines, hand-kerning the type, pair by pair, can make the end result much more pleasing. Besides, working with fonts this closely makes them familiar. * Column width and justification are major elements in design. The narrower the column, the smaller the type can be; wide rows of small type are very hard to read. Often it's a better idea to set narrow columns flush left rather than justified, otherwise large gaps can fall where hyphenation isn't possible. * Use curly quotes. * Don't put two spaces at the end of a line (. ) instead of (. ) when using a proportionally spaced font. Subject: 1.25. Acknowledgements The moderators would like to express their gratitude to the whole community for providing insightful answers to innumerable questions. In particular, the following people (listed alphabetically) have contributed directly to this FAQ (apologies, in advance if anyone has been forgotten): Masumi Abe <abe@keleida.com> Glenn Adams <glenn@metis.COM> Borris Balzer <borris@boba.rhein-main.DE> Charles A. Bigelow <bigelow@cs.stanford.edu> David J. Birnbaum <djbpitt@pitt.edu> Tim Bradshaw <tim.bradshaw@edinburgh.ac.UK> Arlen Britton <arlenb@mcad.edu> Stan Brown <brown@ncoast.org> Scott Brumage <brumage@mailer.acns.fsu.edu> Lee Cambell <elwin@media.mit.edu> Terry Carroll <tjc50@juts.ccc.amdahl.com> Ari Davidow <ari@netcom.com> Pat Farrell <pfarrell@cs.gmu.edu> James Matthew Farrow <matty@cs.su.oz.au> Stephen Friedl <friedl@mtndew.Tustin.CA.US> Yossi Gil <yogi@techunix.technion.ac.IL> Timothy Golobic <an314@cleveland.Freenet.EDU> Kesh Govinder <govinder@ph.und.ac.za> Rick Heli <Rick.Heli@Eng.Sun.COM> Jeremy Henderson <jeremy@castle.ed.ac.uk> Gary <Gocek.Henr801C@Xerox.COM> Berthold K.P. Horn <bkph@ai.mit.edu> Don Hosek <dhosek@ymir.claremont.edu> Bharathi Jagadeesh <bjag@nwu.edu> Chang Jin-woong <jwjang@krissol.kriss.re.kr> David Lemon <lemon@adobe.com> Jon <jgm@cs.brown.EDU> ??? <vkautto@snakemail.hut.FI> ??? <robertk@lotatg.lotus.COM> David Mandl <dmandl@bilbo.shearson.com> Kate McDonnell <C_MCDON@pavo.concordia.ca> George Moore <georgem@microsoft.com> Robert Morris <ram@claude.cs.umb.EDU> Stephen Moye <SMOYE@BROWNVM.brown.edu> Terry O'Donnell <odonnell@mv.us.adobe.COM> Stephen Peters <speters@us.oracle.COM> Bill Phillips <wfp@world.std.com> Jim Reese <Jim.Rees@umich.edu> Bill Ricker <wdr@world.std.com> Liam Quin <lee@sq.com> Henry Schneiker <?> Bill Shirley <bshirley@gleap.jpunix.COM> Cameron Smith <cameron@symcom.math.uiuc.edu> Werenfried Spit <SPIT@vm.ci.uv.ES> Anthony Starks <ajs@merck.com> Ike Stoddard <stoddard@draper.com> Anders Thulin <ath@linkoping.trab.se> Erik-Jan Vens <E.J.Vens@icce.rug.nl> Amanda Walker <amanda@visix.com> Subject: 1.26. A Brief Introduction to Typography Space, time, and bandwidth are too limiting to provide a complete introduction to typography in this space. I'd be very willing to make one available for anonymous ftp, if you want to write one, but I'm not going to write it--I have neither the time nor the expertise. However, the following description of Times, Helvetica, and Courier will suffice for a start. For more information, several books on typography are listed in the bibliography. 1.26.1. Comments by Laurence Penney: Laurence Penney <L.O.R.Penney@cm.cf.ac.uk> offers the following description of Times, Helvetica, and Courier: Times is a typeface designed in the 1930s for the Times newspaper in London and is now used widely in books, magazines and DTP. Its design is based on the typographical principles evolved since Roman times (upper case) and the 16th century (lower case). It is called a TRANSITIONAL typeface, after the typefaces of the 17th century which it resembles. Like all typefaces designed for typesetting large quantities of text, it is proportionally spaced: the i takes about a third the width of an M. Personally I don't like Times too much and prefer the more elegant Garamond and Baskerville, but these will probably cost you money... Note: The Transitionals came after the Old Styles (like Garamond) and before the Moderns (like Bodoni). Helvetica is an example of a SANS-SERIF typeface. These first appeared in the late 19th century in Germany and flourished in the 1920s and 30s, when they were regarded as the future of typography. It's more a geometric design than the humanist design of Gill Sans, but less geometric than Avant Garde and Futura. To my mind it lacks elegance, and Adrian Frutiger's Univers shows how this kind of typeface should be done. (Just compare the B, R, Q, a, g of Univers and Helvetica to see what I mean -- and don't you just love Univers's superbly interpreted ampersand ?!) Helvetica is one of the few fonts that is improved by its BOLD version. Another interesting approach to sans-serif is Optima, by Hermann Zapf, which keeps the stroke-weight variations which sans-serifs usually reject. Use sans-serif fonts for the same applications as Times, above, but where you're less concerned with elegance, and more with a functional appearance - they're generally reckoned to be slightly less legible than good serifed fonts. They're also very suitable for display work. Courier is a typeface derived from typewriter styles. It should ONLY be used when you want to simulate this effect (e.g. when writing letters Courier usually appears ``friendlier'' than Times). Like all typewriter fonts, it is MONOSPACED (characters all have the same width) and is thus suitable for typesetting computer programs. However there are nicer looking monospace fonts than Courier (which has oversize serifs), that still remain distinct from the text fonts like Times and Helvetica. A good one is OCR-B, designed by Frutiger. Note that monospaced fonts are less economical on space than proportional fonts. [ ed: Following the original posting of this message, Laurence Penny and Jason Kim <kim3@husc.harvard.edu> discussed the issue privately. The following summary of their discussion may serve to clarify some of the more subtle points. My thanks to Laurence and Jason for allowing me to include this in the FAQ. ------------------------------ LP-1> The Transitionals came after the Old Styles (like Garamond) and before the Moderns (like Bodoni). JK> Not necessarily true! Ideologically, yes, but not chronologically. I believe, for example, that Bodoni predates New Century Schoolbook or some such typeface. LP-2> What I meant by ``X came after Y'' was ``the first examples of X appeared after the first examples of Y'' -- it's called precis. Some people still make steam trains, but you can still say ``Steam engines came before diesels.'' This is chronological, not ideological in my ------------------------------ LP-1> Another interesting approach to sans-serif is Optima, by Hermann Zapf, which keeps the stroke-weight variations which sans-serifs usually reject. Use sans-serif fonts for the same applications as Times, above, but where you're less concerned with elegance, and more with a functional appearance - they're generally reckoned to be slightly less legible than good seriffed fonts. They're also very suitable for display work. JK> Slightly? I have several textbooks typeset by utter fools and they are a pain in the ass (and eyes) to read! Please don't encourage anyone to use Optima (or any sans serif fonts for that matter) ``for the same applications as Times,'' which, need I remind you, was designed for *newspaper* work!! LP-2> OK, maybe I was a little over-generous to Univers, Helvetica, etc., but I think variation is extremely important in typography. Have you ever read the British magazine ``CAR'' ? That uses Helvetica light (I think) in a very legible and attractive way, IMO. I agree, though, Optima is crappy for text, but it's a very valuable experiment and looks beautiful when printed in high quality for titling, etc. And yes, *books* in Helvtica are generally ------------------------------ JK> Serifs have been scientifically shown to be a *lot* easier on the reader, as they guide the eyes along the lines. LP-2> In all tests I've seen the serifs have always won the day, but only with certain seriffed fonts, and fonts like Univers aren't far behind. The ``tracking'' advantage for serif fonts is reduced when you're talking about narrow newspaper/magazine ------------------------------ JK> You wrote a pretty short and partial history of type. Why ignore the roots of type (blackletter) as well as the climax (moderns--give an explanation) and subsequent 'post-modern' revivals? LP-2> I was just talking about the place the 3 most common DTP types hold in the history of typography, and a few associated pitfalls. It wasn't meant as a ``history of typography'' at all. Please feel free to provide such a history yourself. JK> I think any short list of specific faces is incomplete without mention of Palatino, the most popular Old Style revival in existence. LP-2> Do you? To my mind Palatino is grossly overused. You must agree it looks bad for dense text. It isn't a proper ``oldstyle revival'' at all, more of a ``calligraphic interpretation'' of it. Zapf designed it as a display face, and wasn't too concerned about lining up the serifs (check out the ``t''). And it just *has* to be printed on 1200dpi devices (at least) to look good in small sizes. OK then, maybe a short list is incomplete without a caution NOT to use Palatino... JK> Also, if this is meant to be a ``quick history/user guide for those fairly new to using fonts on desktop publishing systems,'' then I would recommend more directions about the proper uses of certain faces (e.g., Goudy for shaped text, Peignot for display *only*) and styles (e.g., italics for editorial comments, all-caps for basically nothing). LP-2> Okay, okay. I was only sharing a few ideas, not trying to write a book. Surely you agree that the 3 typefaces I chose are by far the most commonly used and abused these days? I don't think a discussion of Goudy or Peignot fits in very well here, unless we're hoping to make a very wide-ranging FAQL. Regarding styles: first, italics are used principally for *emphasis* (rather than bold in running text); second, all good books have a few small caps here and there, don't they? - all mine do... JK> Sorry if I come across as critical. I think the idea of making a FAQL is a good one, as is your effort. We just have to make sure it doesn't give any newbies the wrong impressions and further perpetuate the typographical morass we're facing today. LP-2> Sorry if I come across as defensive, but I stand by what I said and object to the suggestion that I am ``perpetuating the typographical morass''. (I don't know if you really intended this - apologies if you didn't.) 1.26.2. Comments by Don Hosek: Don Hosek offers the following additional notes: The ``Times'' in most printers is actually a newer version of the font than Monotype's ``Times New Roman'' which it is originally based on. Walter Tracy's _Letters of Credit_ gives an excellent history of the face which was based on Plantin and in the original cutting has metrics matching the original face almost exactly. Another interesting note about the face is that it is almost a completely different design in the bold: this is due to the fact that old-styles are difficult to design as a bold. Incidentally, the classification of Times as a transitional is not firm. It likely is placed there by some type taxonomists (most notably Alexander Lawson) because of the bold and a few minor features. Others, myself included, think of it as a old style. The typeface listed in the Adobe catalog as Times Europa was a new face commissioned in 1974 to replace the old Times (whose 50th birthday was this past October 3rd). Hermann Zapf is not particularly pleased with any of the phototypesetting versions of Optima. As a lead face, Optima is very beautiful. His typeface ``World'', used in the World Book Encyclopedia is one recutting for photocomp which improves the font somewhat. He is on record as saying that if he had been asked, he would have designed a new font for the technology. Subject: 1.27. Pronounciation of Font Names Below each of the following font names, a suggested English pronounciation is given. This information was collected from a (relatively) long discussion on comp.fonts. If you disagree, or have other suggestions, please let me know. 1.27.1 Arnold Boecklin ``Ar'' as in car, ``nold'' as in ``old'' with an ``n'' on the front. ``Boeck'' is tricker. The ``oe'' is actually an umlaut ``o'' in German, and the closest sound to most English speakers is an ``er''. So try ``Berklin'' if you want to come close to the original. Otherwise, just say ``Boklin'', with a long o, like in ``boat''. 1.27.2 Benguiat Ben-Gat. This according to an ITC brochure. 1.27.3 Courier I would pronounce Courier not like Jim Courier, but the French way: Ku-rie, where ``Ku'' is pronounced like ``coo'', only short, and ``rie'' is pronounced ``ree-eh''. 1.27.4 Didot Stressed at the last syllable. ``Dee-DOOH'' (not nasal). 1.27.5 Fette Fraktur ``Fet'' as in ``get'' with a ``te'' that rhymes with ``way''. ``Frak'' rhymes with ``mock'', and ``tur'' with ``tour''. 1.27.6 Fenice Feh-nee'-chey 1.27.7 Garamond ``Gara-'': Use a french ``r'' instead of an english one. Both ``a''s are pronounced like the ``u'' in the word ``up''. ``-mond'': the last syllable is stressed, and you don't pronounce the ``n'' and ``d'', but the whole ``ond'' is a nasal ``o''. Hold your nose closed and say ``Ooh'', then you get the right sound. The ``ant'' in ``Avant-Garde'' is very similar to this sound, it is a nasal situated between ``a'' and ``o''. 1.27.8 Helvetica Hell-veh'-ti-ka 1.27.9 Koch Roman Pronounced like scottish `Loch', but with K instead of L. 1.27.10 LaTeX Lamport lists lah'-tech, lah-tech', lay'-tech and lay'-tecks as valid on p.4. Last I talked to him he'd settled into lay'-tech which has always been my pronunciation as well. Somewhere, I heard that LL does explicitly rule out L.A.-tech, but he's from northern California which explains a lot. 1.27.11 Mos Eisley moss eyes-lee 1.27.12 Novarese No-vahr-ay'-zay 1.27.13 Palatino pa-la-TEEN-oh 1.27.14 Peignot There's some contention here, suggested pronouncations: pay-nyoh' ``P'' like ``P'' in `Post'', ``ei'' like ``a'' in ``fan'', ``gn'' like ``n'' in ``noon'' plus ``y'' in ``yes'', ``ot'' -- long, closed ``o'' (I don't know English examples), stressed. ``P'' like ``P'' in `Post'', ``ei'' like ``a'' in ``many'', ``gn'' like ``n'' in ``noon'' plus ``y'' in ``yes'', ``ot'' -- long, closed ``o'' (I don't know English examples), stressed. 1.27.15 Sabon Sah-bon' 1.27.16 TeX Rhymes with Blech, (as in ``Blech, that tasted awfull!'') 1.27.17 Veljovic Vel'-yo-vitch 1.27.18 Zapf Like ``tsapf''. The ``a'' is pronounced like a short version of the well known tongue-depresser vowel ``aaahhh''. Perhaps a better English analogy would be the ``o'' in ``hop'' or ``hops''. Subject: 1.28. What does `lorem ipsum dolor' mean? `Lorem ipsum dolor' is the first part of a nonsense paragraph sometimes used to demonstrate a font. It has been well established that if you write anything as a sample, people will spend more time reading the copy than looking at the font. The ``gibberish'' below is sufficiently like ordinary text to demonstrate a font but doesn't distract the reader. Hopefully. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetaur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum Et harumd und lookum like Greek to me, dereud facilis est er expedit distinct. Nam liber te conscient to factor tum poen legum odioque civiuda. Et tam neque pecun modut est neque nonor et imper ned libidig met, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed ut labore et dolore magna aliquam makes one wonder who would ever read this stuff? Bis nostrud exercitation ullam mmodo consequet. Duis aute in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. At vver eos et accusam dignissum qui blandit est praesent luptatum delenit aigue excepteur sint occae. Et harumd dereud facilis est er expedit distinct. Nam libe soluta nobis eligent optio est congue nihil impedit doming id Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, set eiusmod tempor incidunt et labore et dolore magna aliquam. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exerc. Irure dolor in reprehend incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse molestaie cillum. Tia non ob ea soluad incommod quae egen ium improb fugiend. Officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum Et harumd dereud facilis est er expedit distinct. Nam liber te conscient to factor tum poen legum odioque civiuda et tam. Neque pecun modut est neque nonor et imper ned libidig met, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed ut labore et dolore magna aliquam is nostrud exercitation ullam mmodo consequet. Duis aute in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. At vver eos et accusam dignissum qui blandit est praesent. Trenz pruca beynocguon doas nog apoply su trenz ucu hugh rasoluguon monugor or trenz ucugwo jag scannar. Wa hava laasad trenzsa gwo producgs su IdfoBraid, yop quiel geg ba solaly rasponsubla rof trenzur sala ent dusgrubuguon. Offoctivo immoriatoly, hawrgasi pwicos asi sirucor.Thas sirutciun applios tyu thuso itoms ghuso pwicos gosi sirucor in mixent gosi sirucor ic mixent ples cak ontisi sowios uf Zerm hawr rwivos. Unte af phen neige pheings atoot Prexs eis phat eit sakem eit vory gast te Plok peish ba useing phen roxas. Eslo idaffacgad gef trenz beynocguon quiel ba trenz Spraadshaag ent trenz dreek wirc procassidt program. Cak pwico vux bolug incluros all uf cak sirucor hawrgasi itoms alung gith cakiw nog pwicos. Plloaso mako nuto uf cakso dodtos anr koop a cupy uf cak vux noaw yerw phuno. Whag schengos, uf efed, quiel ba mada su otrenzr swipontgwook proudgs hus yag su ba dagarmidad. Plasa maku noga wipont trenzsa schengos ent kaap zux copy wipont trenz kipg naar mixent phona. Cak pwico siructiun ruos nust apoply tyu cak UCU sisulutiun munityuw uw cak UCU-TGU jot scannow. Trens roxas eis ti Plokeing quert loppe eis yop prexs. Piy opher hawers, eit yaggles orn ti sumbloat alohe plok. Su havo loasor cakso tgu pwuructs tyu InfuBwain, ghu gill nug bo suloly sispunsiblo fuw cakiw salo anr ristwibutiun. Hei muk neme eis loppe. Treas em wankeing ont sime ploked peish rof phen sumbloat syug si phat phey gavet peish ta paat ein pheeir sumbloats. Aslu unaffoctor gef cak siructiun gill bo cak spiarshoot anet cak GurGanglo gur pwucossing pwutwam. Ghat dodtos, ig pany, gill bo maro tyu ucakw suftgasi pwuructs hod yot tyubo rotowminor. Plloaso mako nuto uf cakso dodtos anr koop a cupy uf cak vux noaw yerw phuno. Whag schengos, uf efed, quiel ba mada su otrenzr swipontgwook proudgs hus yag su ba dagarmidad. Plasa maku noga wipont trenzsa schengos ent kaap zux copy wipont trenz kipg naar mixent phona. Cak pwico siructiun ruos nust apoply tyu cak UCU sisulutiun munityuw uw cak UCU-TGU jot scannow. Trens roxas eis ti Plokeing quert loppe eis yop prexs. Piy opher hawers, eit yaggles orn ti sumbloat alohe plok. Su havo loasor cakso tgu pwuructs tyu. [ This version was found on CompuServe. It differs from other versions I have seen in print, increasingly so as you go along. It almost looks computer-generated, doesn't it? ]