Damian.Cugley@prg.ox.ac.uk (Damian Cugley) (04/26/91)
I've acquired a little space on the Oxford archive-server for a
"pre-release" version of Malvern (a sanserif METAFONT font) and MFjob (a
C wrapper about METAFONT useful with families). More details below.
HOW TO GET THEM. The archive server is e-mail oriented.
Send a message with the line
send prog mfjob-2.7-1.shar mfjob-2.7-2.shar
to <archiver-server@prg.ox.ac.uk>. Both MFjob and Malvern are divided
into two parts for mail systems that can't handle files >100K. If yours
is such, you will have to sent two "send prog ..." mail messages, one
for each part.
For Malvern, substitute "malvern-0.3" for "mfjob-2.7" and "tex" for
"prog". The archive-server also understands the messages "help", "index
prog" and "index tex".
WHAT MFJOB IS. MFjob grew out of a UNIX shellscript I had for running
METAFONT and installing the TFM and PK files. Its unique feature is
that it will parse a font name "mabi10" as Malvern bold italic 10pt and
run METAFONT with variables like |weight| and |italicness| set
appropriately (all that is user-definable, of course). The driver file
understands these and sets stem widths etc. based on them. The
practical upshot of which is that I have one driver file ma.mf and a
command like
mfjob ma{,i,bx}{8,10,12}
creates 9 fonts automagically. MFjob isn't vital but it is *very*
convenient for creating fonts on the fly. So far it has been tested on
SunOS only but I think its chances of running on other UNIX platforms
are reasonable. Call it a beta release.:-)
MFjob comes with three sample meta-fonts thrown in for free!
WHAT MALVERN IS. Malvern grew out of my frustration with trying to get
what I consider a pleasing sanserif font out of the CM program files.
Its design is intended to be simple and elegant, a touch old-fashioned,
and very different from (say) CMSS or Helvetica (I consider this its
main attraction:-). It is intended to be used by itself as the main
font of a document, rather than being another alphabet for mathematics!
It has at least the following eccentric features:
\\ rounded terminals -- like Helvetica Rounded. Not entirely unrelated
to the fact that almost all the characters are drawn with a round
pen. (This was a deliberate design decision, not just laziness!:-)
\\ three sets of figures -- ranging, "text" (sort-of old-style) and
small figures for footnotes and fractions.
\\ a distinct italic face. (Looks kind of wonky, though.)
\\ four alphabets -- lower case, small, medium and large caps. Medium
caps can be used with a separate set of accents to make accented
capital letters.
\\ more currency signs and quote marks than anyone could want,
including the dubious PostScript florin sign and single guillemets.
\\ a raised "c" for writing names like "McDonald" (if you are feeling
like being eccentric).
However, Malvern is UNFINISHED -- the italic corrections and kerning
table are half-done and I need to write some VF stuff to make fonts with
other encodings (e.g., the TUGboat 11#4 encoding, which includes
accented letters). I'm making it available now so interested people can
try it out and offer advice.
"share and enjoy"
---- Damian Cugley -------------------------------- pdc@prg.ox.ac.uk ---
Computing Laboratory, 11 Keble Rd, Oxford OX1 3QD Great Britain
------------------------------------------------------------------------mathew@mantis.co.uk (mathew) (04/26/91)
Damian.Cugley@prg.ox.ac.uk (Damian Cugley) writes: > Malvern grew out of my frustration with trying to get > what I consider a pleasing sanserif font out of the CM program files. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^ > Its design is intended to be simple and elegant, a touch old-fashioned, > and very different from (say) CMSS or Helvetica (I consider this its > main attraction:-). It is intended to be used by itself as the main ^^^^^^^^^^^ > font of a document, rather than being another alphabet for mathematics! ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ > \\ a distinct italic face. (Looks kind of wonky, though.) ^^^^^^^^^^^ AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGHHH!!! Why not go the whole hog and print your entire book in underlined bold zapf chancery? mathew -- If you're a John Foxx fan, please mail me!
jeffrey@cs.chalmers.se (Alan Jeffrey) (04/28/91)
Mathew@mantis.co.uk (mathew) writes: >Damian.Cugley@prg.ox.ac.uk (Damian Cugley) writes: >> Malvern grew out of my frustration with trying to get >> what I consider a pleasing sanserif font out of the CM program files. > ^^^^^^^^^^^^^ > and very different from (say) CMSS or Helvetica (I consider this its > main attraction:-). It is intended to be used by itself as the main > ^^^^^^^^^^^ >> font of a document, rather than being another alphabet for mathematics! > ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ [...] >Why not go the whole hog and print your entire book in underlined bold zapf >chancery? Because underlined bold Zapf Chancery doesn't have a history and tradition of use as a book font, whereas sans serif fonts do. You may not be a particular fan of the Bauhaus/asymmetric/geometric school of book design, but it would be a brave individual who would deny the tremendous impact it had on the look and feel of 20th century typesetting. Sans serif fonts are eminently suitable for setting book matter that won't be read for hours at a time, such as magazines, some technical reference books, advertising matter and children's books. It's also suitable for display work and headings. At the moment, the only sans serif fonts available to all TeX installations are cmss (which is a very nice display font, but unfortunately digitizes badly, and so is unsuitable for use as a 300dpi book font) and cmssq (which I happen to like quite a bit, but it's very... er... idiosyncratic). To get more than this, you need to run with PS fonts, and even then, many of them are designed for >1000dpi and digitize appallingly. (I've even seen a professional (no names, no pack drill) implementation of Gill Sans with a ragged baseline, barf city.) One of TeX's biggest problems is it's lack of alternatives to CMR, and so salutes should be made to people like Damian (and Yannis and Micheal and all the others) who are trying to make life bearable for those of us who would like a few more options than `Any colour you like as long as it's CMR.' Cheers, Alan. Alan Jeffrey Tel: +46 31 72 10 98 jeffrey@cs.chalmers.se Department of Computer Sciences, Chalmers University, Gothenburg, Sweden
mathew@mantis.co.uk (mathew) (04/30/91)
jeffrey@cs.chalmers.se (Alan Jeffrey) writes: > Because underlined bold Zapf Chancery doesn't have a history and > tradition of use as a book font, whereas sans serif fonts do. You may not > be a particular fan of the Bauhaus/asymmetric/geometric school of book > design, but it would be a brave individual who would deny the tremendous > impact it had on the look and feel of 20th century typesetting. Actually, I'm a great fan of geometric sans serif fonts IN THEIR PLACE. > Sans serif fonts are eminently suitable for setting book matter that > won't be read for hours at a time, such as magazines, some technical > reference books, advertising matter and children's books. I would phrase it as "You can get away with setting body text in a sans serif font if the reader's not going to have to look at it for long." > It's also > suitable for display work and headings. It's *excellent* for display work and headings. I quite agree with the rest of what you say about TeX; it does lack good alternatives to Computer Modern. I'm pleased to see new METAFONT fonts arriving; I was just reacting (or over-reacting) to the suggestion that an italic (or slanted) sans-serif font was a good font to set the main body of a piece of text in. Bung a few smileys in the article and read it again, if you like. mathew -- mathew - mathew@mantis.co.uk or mcsun!ukc!ibmpcug!mantis!mathew
Damian.Cugley@prg.ox.ac.uk (Damian Cugley) (05/03/91)
MFjob has exhibited the extected embarassing teething problems and there
is now a version 2.7.1 on the Oxford archive and a (largish) set of
patches. V2.7.1 is basically what 2.7 should have been in the first
place :-(. Pending requests for 2.7 have been replaced with 2.7.1.
Also, there is a "supplement" to the "pre-release" Malvern -- a set of
driver files that can be used to create a subset of the fonts, without
using MFjob.
Finally, there is a mailing-list for MFjob and Malvern -- intended to
carry occasional bug fixs for MFjob, comments and suggestions for
Malvern and announcements of new "releases". Mail me at the address
<malvern-request@prg.ox.ac.uk> to ask to be put on the list.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
The archive server is e-mail oriented. It will only send messages of
less than 100K so you have to send two requests to get both parts of
2-part packages. Send a message with the line
send CATAGORY FILE
to <archive-server@prg.ox.ac.uk>, where CATAGORY is replaced with either
"tex" for Malvern or "prog" for MFjob, and FILE is one of:
mfjob-271-1.shar ) MFjob 2.7.1 (C program for UNIX -- only tested
mfjob-271-2.shar ) on Suns so far though)
mfjob-patch01.shar patches from 2.7 -> 2.7.1
malvern-0.3-1.shar ) Malvern (METAFONT code and a few extra files)
malvern-0.3-2.shar )
malvern-sup1.shar METAFONT driver files for creating Malvern
fonts without MFjob
The archive-server also understands the messages "help" and "index
CATAGORY".
---- Damian Cugley -------------------------------- pdc@prg.ox.ac.uk ---
Computing Laboratory, 11 Keble Rd, Oxford OX1 3QD Great Britain
------------------------------------------------------------------------
"share and enjoy"jeffrey@fwi.uva.nl (Alan Jeffrey) (05/03/91)
In article <1yX8115w164w@mantis.co.uk> mathew@mantis.co.uk (mathew) writes: >Actually, I'm a great fan of geometric sans serif fonts IN THEIR PLACE. Yes, and that place includes magazine and technical documents, for which you need a full range of faces available (including bold sans serif slanted at silly sizes). Nobody's suggesting you run an entire book in sans serif slantex, but you need it available if you want to run a book (or magazine or whatever) in sans serif. Alan.
Damian.Cugley@prg.ox.ac.uk (Damian Cugley) (05/05/91)
> From: mathew <mathew@mantis.co.uk> > Message-Id: <1yX8115w164w@mantis.co.uk> > I'm pleased to see new METAFONT > fonts arriving; I was just reacting (or over-reacting) to the > suggestion that an italic (or slanted) sans-serif font was a good font > to set the main body of a piece of text in. By "distinct" I meant "separate", "different", "not-the-same" -- so that by "distinct italic face" I meant that the italic is not just a slanted version of the roman face, like Gill Sans and unlike Helvetica. Normally the main body of the text would be set in the upright version; only the *italics* would be set in italics. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ I'd be interested in comments & suggetsions on sanserif type design... Malvern mailing list -- <malvern-request@prg.ox.ac.uk>. //- Damian Cugley ----\ /--- Oxford University Computing Laboratory, -\ || pdc@prg.ox.ac.uk || \--- 11 Keble Rd, Oxford, UK OX1 3QD --------/ || pdc@uk.ac.ox.prg || \--------------------// "His feet are the wrong size for his shoes."