[comp.text.tex] conversion of .tfm font files into .pk or .gf format

bulsara@rainbow.ecn.purdue.edu (Vispi H Bulsara) (06/20/91)

I would like to know if there is any program that converts .tfm font
files to .*gf or .*pk format which is used for previewing and printing.

I am running TeX, C Version 2.95 on SUN SPARCstation 1 and SUN 3/60
workstations.

Thanks,
Vispi (bulsara@gn.ecn.purdue.edu)

bayerf@Informatik.TU-Muenchen.DE (Friedrich Bayer) (06/21/91)

In article <1991Jun19.220225.17780@noose.ecn.purdue.edu> bulsara@rainbow.ecn.purdue.edu (Vispi H Bulsara) writes:
>I would like to know if there is any program that converts .tfm font
>files to .*gf or .*pk format which is used for previewing and printing.
>
>I am running TeX, C Version 2.95 on SUN SPARCstation 1 and SUN 3/60
>workstations.
>
>Thanks,
>Vispi (bulsara@gn.ecn.purdue.edu)


I'm sorry, but there is absolutely NO way to do that !
Explanation: *.tfm files contain only metric information on fonts used
by TeX to determine the layout of your text (simply spoken :-)), but
they don't contain any graphic information on the font itself.
So, the only way to obtain the *.gf and *.pk files is to ftp them from
some site (the standard fonts are PD) or to generate them with
MetaFont (a program that generates font graphics and font metrics from
font (mathematical) font descriptions)

So much for now, you should consult your local TeX gurus for more details
:-)

Greetings, Fred

Damian.Cugley@prg.ox.ac.uk (Damian Cugley) (06/21/91)

> From:		Vispi H Bulsara <bulsara@rainbow.ecn.purdue.edu>
> Message-Id:	<1991Jun19.220225.17780@noose.ecn.purdue.edu>

> I would like to know if there is any program that converts .tfm font
> files to .*gf or .*pk format which is used for previewing and printing.

No.  The TFM file does not have any information at all not even a little
bit about the appearance of the letters, only their widths and other
*F*ont *M*etrics used by TeX.

You need to find the original source files for the TFM, and produce GF
and then PK from that -- usually these are METAFONT programs (.mf) but
there are other formats (Bitstream do conversions from their outline
descriptions into TFM/PXL etc. etc.).

On the other hand, fonts resident in printers -- such as a PostScript
ones -- often have TFM files but no GF or PK file because the printer
knows everything there is to know about how to draw the characters.
You may not be able to preview documents using these fonts.

 /-------------------\/--------------------\/---------------------------\
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changj@turing.cs.rpi.edu (John Chang) (06/25/91)

   In article <1991Jun19.220225.17780@noose.ecn.purdue.edu> bulsara@rainbow.
   ecn.purdue.edu (Vispi H Bulsara) writes:
   >I would like to know if there is any program that converts .tfm font
   >files to .*gf or .*pk format which is used for previewing and printing.
   >
   >I am running TeX, C Version 2.95 on SUN SPARCstation 1 and SUN 3/60
   >workstations.
   >
   >Thanks,
   >Vispi (bulsara@gn.ecn.purdue.edu)

  >> I'm sorry, but there is absolutely NO way to do that !
  >> Explanation: *.tfm files contain only metric information on fonts used
  >> by TeX to determine the layout of your text (simply spoken :-)), but
  >> they don't contain any graphic information on the font itself.
  >> So, the only way to obtain the *.gf and *.pk files is to ftp them from
  >> some site (the standard fonts are PD) or to generate them with
  >> MetaFont (a program that generates font graphics and font metrics from
  >> font (mathematical) font descriptions)

To follow up on this subject, how do you generate .gf and .pk using MetaFont?
I followed the instruction in one of the README's but I can't get it to work
properly.  For example, it says:

	mf '\mode:=sun;\mag=SMALL/1000;\batchmode;\input YYY'
	mf '\mode:=sun;\mag=LARGE/1000;\batchmode;\input YYY'

would produce YYY.85gf and YYY.95gf respectively (where YYY is the fontname).
However I can only get .85gf, even if I substitute 1000 for something else.  
I guess I don't really understand what magnification and all that are.  What
do I have to use to get, say, *.102gf (one of the ones I need)?  Thanks for
any help.