[NTLK] Installing new fonts?

[Warren Ockrassa]

On Nov 29, 2011, at 15:52, Max Smith <maxmaxmaxmaxsmith at gmail.com> wrote:

> I've always liked Verdana's x-height but not the wide spacing between  
> the letters, a la monospaced typefaces. Georgia, not so much.

They're somewhat unlovely, but a good solution to a difficult problem: maximum legibility and readability on 1-bit LCD, phosphor, and modern LCD screens coupled with the same for hardcopy. So there is some odd kerning in Verdana, and both it and Georgia have a tall x-height. They do seem to get the job done, though. 

Note too that Verdana actually has two serifed glyphs, the cap I and the number 1. Nice little break from the all-sans mold, and a necessary one too. 

> I think  
> the best work of Carter is Bell Centennial, but he was definitely  
> very inventive when working to overcome technical limitations.

Bell is lovely, yes. 

>> 680x0 emulation
> 
> Why not PowerPC?

Availability of ROMs coupled with the need to get an old Mac OS install. I found downloadable ROMs for 040 machines, and got the 7.5.3 installers right from Apple. It's plenty fast on my i7 quad core iMac. Much much faster than any Quadra or Performa ever was. 

Now I just need to do something useful with it. I got Fontographer to export suitcases with bitmapped TTF fonts in them, but the results are radically at variance from anything I've seen documented for Newton font creation. The resource tables are different from the examples, and heck if I know why or what to do about it - though I've not had time to go into much depth yet. 

Looking at the old Newton font converter rang bells. I futzed around with it when it was new, when I had my original MP 120. I don't remember it being hard to work with then. So the question is what's changed since then, and how to work around that. 

• Warren • off console • w azkrmc.com • h nightwares.com •