Frequently Asked Questions About Fonts

The comp.fonts FAQ, Version 2.0.6., January 05, 1995

• General Information
• Font Houses
  • Compugraphic
  • Miles, Agfa Division
• What's the difference between all these font formats?
• What about ``Multiple Master'' fonts?
• Is there a methodology to describe and classify typefaces?
• What is the ``f'' shaped ``s'' called?
• What about ``Colonial'' Typefaces?
  • Why does colonial printing have that ``Colonial'' feel?
  • What fonts are good for mock-colonial uses?
  • What fonts could a colonial printer have had?
• Where can I get ... fonts.
• Where can I get fonts for non-Roman alphabets?
• What about fonts with the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) symbols?
  • Shareware or free (PostScript Type 1 and/or TrueType):
  • Shareware or free (TeX):
  • Commercial:
• How can I convert my ... font to ... format?
• Are fonts copyrightable?
• Typeface Protection
  • Preamble
    • Who makes type designs?
    • The problem of plagiarism
    • Kinds of protection for type
      • Trademark
      • Copyright
      • Design Patent
      • Invention Patent
      • Trade Secret
      • Ethics
    • Further reading
    • Disclaimer
• File Formats
  • File Format Extensions
  • Font Formats
  • Font Format Extensions
• Ligatures
• Built-in Fonts
• Glossary
• Bibliography
• Font Encoding Standards
• TrueType
• Unicode Information
  • Unicode Editing
    • Is a special keyboard required?
    • Is roman-to-Unicode conversion available?
  • Are there PostScript or TrueType fonts available?
• Can I Print Checks with the MICR Font?
• Rules of Thumb
• Acknowledgements
• A Brief Introduction to Typography
  • Comments by Laurence Penney:
  • Comments by Don Hosek:
• Pronounciation of Font Names
  • Arnold Boecklin
  • Benguiat
  • Courier
  • Didot
  • Fette Fraktur
  • Fenice
  • Garamond
  • Helvetica
  • Koch Roman
  • LaTeX
  • Mos Eisley
  • Novarese
  • Palatino
  • Peignot
  • Sabon
  • TeX
  • Veljovic
  • Zapf
• What does `lorem ipsum dolor' mean?
• Macintosh Information
• Macintosh Font formats
• Frequently Requested Mac Fonts
• Commercial Font Sources
• Mac Font Installation
• Mac Font Utilities
• Making Outline Fonts
• Problems and Possible Solutions
• Creating Mac screen fonts
  • Creating Mac screen fonts from Type 1 outlines
• MS-DOS Information
• Frequently Requested MS-DOS fonts
• MS-DOS Font Installation
• What exactly are the encodings of the DOS code pages?
• MS-DOS Font Utilities
• Converting fonts under MS-DOS
• Converting Mac Type 1 fonts to MS-DOS format
  • The tools you need
  • How to do it?
  • Other comments
• Converting PC Type 1 and TrueType fonts to Mac format
• Converting PC Type 1 fonts into TeX PK bitmap fonts
• Converting TeX PK bitmaps into HP LaserJet softfonts (and vice-versa)
• TrueType to HP LaserJet bitmap softfonts (HACK!)
• MS-DOS Screen Fonts (EGA/VGA text-mode fonts)
• OS/2 Information
  • David Birnbaum's Introduction
• Preliminaries
• Fonts under DOS
• Windows
• Differences between Windows and OS/2
• Installation under Windows and Win-OS/2
• FontSpecific PostScript Encoding
• AdobeStandardEncoding
• AdobeStandardEncoding under Windows (and Win-OS/2)
• AdobeStandardEncoding under OS/2
• Consequences for OS/2 users
• Advice to the user
• OS/2 2.1 and beyond
• Unix Information
• Sun Information
• Fonts Under Open Windows
• Does OpenWindows support Type 1 PostScript fonts?
• Improving font rendering time
• Making bitmap fonts for faster startup
• Converting between font formats (convertfont, etc.)
• Xview/OLIT fonts at 100 dpi
• Where can I order F3 fonts for NeWSprint and OpenWindows?
• NeXT Information
• Tell me about NeXTstep fonts
  • Basic Format
  • Font Folder and Font Filename Requirements
    • For NeXTstep 1.0 ONLY, you also need to take the following steps:
    • For NeXTstep 2.0 and up:
• Tell me more about NeXTstep fonts
  • Where to Obtain Fonts for NeXTstep
    • Converted Fonts After Conversion
    • About Conversion Utilities
      • NeXTstep utilities
    • Installation
• Porting fonts to the NeXT
  • Porting PC/Unix Type 1 Fonts
  • Porting Mac Type 1 Fonts
    • MacToPfa
    • MetroTools
  • Porting PC (PFB) Type 1 Fonts
• Font availability
• Why can I only install 256 fonts on my NeXT?
• Amiga Information
  • Font Concepts
  • Amiga Font Formats
  • Frequently Requested Amiga Fonts
  • Commercial Font Sources
  • Non-Latin fonts on the Amiga
  • Amiga Font Installation
  • Amiga Font Utilities
  • Making Outline Fonts
  • Problems and Possible Solutions
  • Adobe Type 1 fonts for the Amiga
• X11 Information
• Getting X11
• Historical Notes about X11
• X11 Font Formats
• X11 Font Server Information
• Fonts and utilities for X11
• Utilities
• PS2PK
  • When do you need ps2pk?
• TeX Utilities
  • MetaFont
    • About MetaFont:
    • What do you need in order to use the fonts:
• MFPic
• fig2MF
• GNU Font Utilities
• Font Editors
• The T1 Utilities
• Where to get bitmap versions of the fonts
• Converting between font formats
• Getting fonts by FTP and Mail
• MetaFont to PostScript Conversion
• How to use Metafont fonts with Troff
• PKtoBDF / MFtoBDF
• PKtoPS
• PKtoSFP / SFPtoPK
• PostScript to MetaFont
  • pfb2pfa
  • pfa2chr
  • chr2ps
  • ps2mf
• Mac Bitmaps to BDF Format
• Vendor Information