Keyboard mapping a font?

[staggers]

Thanks very much for all that.

Slightly to my own surprise I find I'm actually looking forward to all this.

And yesterday I also upgraded to WD MX Premium, so I have a lot to do, but as I say, I'm looking forward to it.

Thanks again all of you for your help.

Regards

Staggers.

[Gare]

Before anyone goes any farther with Type Tool, please read this concerning something called The Winding Path Rule, and save yourself some aggravation!


The Winding Path Rule states that the fill to a closed curve must go to the right of the outline. A character that has a hole in it, like the letter "O", has to have that path going in the opposite direction as the outer path. When you draw characters, pay attention to the direction of the curve. Xara DP and CorelDraw don't care about this rule, but Microsoft Expression Graphic Designer (formerly Expression) and Adobe Illustrator both offer path direction tools for "compound paths". And Xara can reverse paths, too, although you can draw correct joined shapes usually without the need to correct anything later. Use a node or path selection tool in combination with the reverse curve direction feature if you have paths going in the wrong way.



What happens if characters have paths going in the wrong direction? Most of the time, nothing, but 3D applications such as XARA 3D are very sensitive to path direction. Keep those directions going the proper way in your fonts, and you will be able to sell them for more money!

Right-click over a node in the glyph window in Type Tool and FontLab if the preview has a "counter" in it that looks filled in. Choose "Reverse Contour" and life (and typography) is good.

-g-

[angelize]

I have a question regarding Type tool 3 I am still playing around with the demo, but I am wondering if it has an option to let you set what restrictions you do or do not want, such as if you want to allow embedding

[Gare]

I just ran the demo, and then brought an exported typeface into FontLab.

It tells me that it is: Only Previewing and Printing is allowed (read only), which means you can send it out to the web via WD MX if this is what you're asking, but the demo is so crippled I would only do this with a registered copy Frances. The exports have "FontLab", "FL" violations in the center of the glyphs.

-g-

[mwenz]

Frances,

I do not believe that TT has any options to set restrictions. Therefore, the font can be pretty much used for anything (usual caveats) like most every one of my installed fonts.

Take care, Mike

[Gare]

On that note, how does the average person tell what restrictions are coded into a typeface?

I realize that none of the tg members are average, but seriously: FontLab can reassign permissions and tells you the current restrictions on any font one loads, but that sort of begs you getting FontLab.

And I'm not sure the test I ran will hold up if you buy the commercial copy. Mike, is there a page like this is the commercial version or not?



BTW, nice, clean avatar, Mike! I like the warm and cold muted colors workin' with and against each other.

-g

[mwenz]

Hi Gary--not that I can find. And the PDF help file does not shed much light other than to discuss formats that allow/disallow embedding restrictions, etc.

Windows Explorer shows relevant information:



MainType (and likely other font managers) show embeddable status.

Here's the relevant (and only) screen from TT for font parameters:



Take care, Mike
(thanks)