[comp.windows.ms] Why do you like/hate ATM?

A.G.Bishop@massey.ac.nz (A.G. Bishop) (02/05/91)

So, you have an opinion on ATM,

I ran it, found it slowed my SX down a bit and didn't do a lot else.

Maybe I'm still fresh and enthusiastic about graphical interfaces but
seeing the characters the right size still seems fine to me, I'm not
bothered by the jaggies on those couple of 36pt lines for the title.

Perhaps now as more type 1 fonts are appearing on CICA it might be
fun but I still wonder if ATM is worth the diskspace.

What's wrong with screen fonts?

What am I missing?

I'd love to hear your comments, pro & con.

Thanx

-- 
Tony Bishop
Massey University @Palmerston North.New Zealand

U39648@uicvm.uic.edu (From The Mind Of) (02/05/91)

My basic use of Adobe Type Manager is getting fonts, in all sizes, to print on
my printer.  Plus, the availability of so many Adobe Type 1 fonts around helps.
How many inexpensive printers do you know of that can print many fonts in ALL
sizes?  All of them... that have Windows 3.0 drivers if you use ATM.

The use on-screen for me is a MUCH better attempt at WYSIWYG than Windows gives
by default.  Unfortunately, it's still not 100% perfect.  (PageMaker tip: when
I'm using ATM, the on-screen appearance gets closer to what gets printed out
the farther out I zoom.  So do a "fit in window" view before printing to see if
the larger objects stay around the text as you want them to!)

- Darius
=========================================================================
  BITNET: U39648@UICVM              |      "Don't set fire to strangers."
Internet: u39648@uicvm.uic.edu      |      - Mr. Zarniwoop

jacksu@sara.atmos.uiuc.edu (Jack Su) (02/05/91)

In article <91035.212444U39648@uicvm.uic.edu> From The Mind Of <U39648@uicvm.uic.edu> writes:
>My basic use of Adobe Type Manager is getting fonts, in all sizes, to print on
>my printer.  Plus, the availability of so many Adobe Type 1 fonts around helps.
>How many inexpensive printers do you know of that can print many fonts in ALL
>sizes?  All of them... that have Windows 3.0 drivers if you use ATM.
>

Does ATM support printing type 1 fonts to a 512 KB Laserjet Plus?  Also can ATM use the .afm font files?  

Thanks in advance, and sorry if this was discussed previously.

Jack (j-su@uiuc.edu)

altman@sbstaff2.cs.sunysb.edu (Jeff Altman) (02/05/91)

In article <1991Feb4.205509.6260@massey.ac.nz> A.G.Bishop@massey.ac.nz (A.G. Bishop) writes:
>So, you have an opinion on ATM,

Yes, I love it.

>I ran it, found it slowed my SX down a bit and didn't do a lot else.

How much memory do you have?   What have you set the cache to?
Also, compared to what?  If you ever use the Windows Vector fonts
I am sure that you will find ATM to be quite a bit faster and more
accurate.

>Maybe I'm still fresh and enthusiastic about graphical interfaces but
>seeing the characters the right size still seems fine to me, I'm not
>bothered by the jaggies on those couple of 36pt lines for the title.

It also depends on what printer you have.  The main benefit for me is
that I can write a Report or a Spreadsheet at home (Postscript) and
bring it to the office make some changes and have it print exactly
the way it printed at home.

>Perhaps now as more type 1 fonts are appearing on CICA it might be
>fun but I still wonder if ATM is worth the diskspace.

I also like the ability to create my own fonts and use them in my
system immediately.  (ATM uses the fonts, it doesn't create them.)

>What's wrong with screen fonts?

They are misshaped and limited to exact sizes.  Therefore, if you
ask WfW for a Helv 9 it will give you an 8 anyway.

>What am I missing?

I don't know.

>I'd love to hear your comments, pro & con.

You just got the pro.

>Thanx

You're welcome.

>-- 
>Tony Bishop
>Massey University @Palmerston North.New Zealand


--
- Jeff (jaltman@ccmail.sunysb.edu)

tom@mims-iris.waterloo.edu (Tom Haapanen) (02/06/91)

> A.G.Bishop@massey.ac.nz (A.G. Bishop) writes:
>> So, you have an opinion on ATM,

Jeff Altman <altman@sbstaff2.cs.sunysb.edu> writes:
> Yes, I love it.

I got ATM last week.  I've been also using FaceLift for several months now.
A few opinionated opinions will follow...  :)

> It also depends on what printer you have.  The main benefit for me is
> that I can write a Report or a Spreadsheet at home (Postscript) and
> bring it to the office make some changes and have it print exactly
> the way it printed at home.

Also, both ATM and FaceLift provide flexible on-the-fly fonts for LaserJet-
series printers (and dot-matrix, too, but that's rather painfully slow).

>> Perhaps now as more type 1 fonts are appearing on CICA it might be
>> fun but I still wonder if ATM is worth the diskspace.

Yes, this is the big advantage of ATM over FaceLift, and the reason I bought
ATM when I already had FaceLift.

>> What's wrong with screen fonts?

> They are misshaped and limited to exact sizes.  Therefore, if you
> ask WfW for a Helv 9 it will give you an 8 anyway.

However, on the screen 10-point Helv looks better than either 10-point
Helvetica or 10-point Swiss.  Despite hinting, good screen fonts are hard to
produce on the fly in small sizes.

As to the FaceLift/ATM comparison, here are what I've found so far:

	ATM:	    + standard PostScript fonts
		    + lots of free Type 1 fonts available
		    - Helv is no longer available!  Program Manager and other
		      apps asking for small Helv sizes get System font

	FaceLift:   + much better control panel
		    + can generate soft fonts
		    + better documentation
		    - slightly slower screen fonts than ATM

If anyone knows how to resurrect Helv in my system with ATM, please let me 
know!  Right now, if I set SynonymPSBegin=11 in atm.ini, sizes 10 points and
below (and my old soft fonts) all display in the System font in the single
available size.

[ \tom haapanen --- university of waterloo --- tom@mims-iris.waterloo.edu ]
[ "i don't even know what street canada is on"               -- al capone ]

altman@sbgrad6.cs.sunysb.edu (Jeff Altman) (02/07/91)

In article <1991Feb6.125123.11623@watserv1.waterloo.edu> tom@mims-iris.waterloo.edu (Tom Haapanen) writes:

>	ATM:	    + standard PostScript fonts
>		    + lots of free Type 1 fonts available
>		    - Helv is no longer available!  Program Manager and other
>		      apps asking for small Helv sizes get System font

Helv is only replaced if you have the Alias set for Helv=Helvetica.  Take
out this line and Helv will not be replaced by Helvetica at all for printing.
The similar synonym line specifies that Helv will be replaced with 
Helvetica for screen fonts.  The PSSynonymBegin line specifies at what pt 
size should the Synonym become active.



--
- Jeff (jaltman@ccmail.sunysb.edu)

tom@mims-iris.waterloo.edu (Tom Haapanen) (02/08/91)

I previously wrote:
>	ATM:	    + standard PostScript fonts
>		    + lots of free Type 1 fonts available
>		    - Helv is no longer available!
                      ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>	FaceLift:   + much better control panel
>		    + can generate soft fonts
>		    + better documentation
>		    - slightly slower screen fonts than ATM
>
> If anyone knows how to resurrect Helv in my system with ATM [...]

Well, I've solved this one!  It appears that somehow I had managed to have
two copies of Helv installed in my control panel ("set #6" and "VGA res", both
called helve.fon).  Removing one of these made Helv come back to life...
So ATM is OK on that count!

[ \tom haapanen --- university of waterloo --- tom@mims-iris.waterloo.edu ]
[ "i don't even know what street canada is on"               -- al capone ]