Re: further notes on using Pango

From: Andrew Dunbar (hippietrail@yahoo.com)
Date: Fri Apr 26 2002 - 12:17:46 EDT

  • Next message: Christian Biesinger: "Re: further notes on using Pango"

     --- Leonard Rosenthol <leonardr@lazerware.com> wrote:
    > At 3:45 AM +0100 4/26/02, Andrew Dunbar wrote:
    > >Am I right in believing we don't actually need to
    > >build FreeType on platforms that already use the
    > real
    > >TrueType such as Windows and Mac?
    >
    > No, you are NOT correct.
    >
    >
    > >FreeType is an exact reproduction of the TrueType
    > APIs right?
    >
    > TrueType is a font format - it's NOT an SDK/API.
    > FreeType
    > is a library/SDK/API that provides a single API for
    > access to
    > numerous font formats (TrueType, Type1, OpenType,
    > etc.).
    >
    >
    > >I also
    > >think TrueType is probably faster than FreeType and
    > >of course it has the patent on hinting which is
    > >usually turned off in FreeType for legal reasons.
    >
    > It is true that the TTF renderers in both Windows
    > and MacOS
    > have the license for the specifically patented
    > hinting aspect of
    > those fonts, and so for SOME glyphs in SOME fonts,
    > they will render
    > better with the native code than with FreeType.
    >
    > But having a single XP API for all platforms will
    > be a worth
    > (IMHO) the small cost of quality for those few
    > glyphs & fonts -
    > especially if we have the auto-hinter in FreeType
    > enabled.

    We can have a single XP API without having a single
    implementation. We already do this for a huge
    percentage of the AbiWord code. One of the things
    most highly prized by many AbiWord users is it's small
    footprint. I just can't imagine that doubling up on
    renderer implementations is a better thing than
    abstracting the APIs for renderers which do the same
    thing with the same file format on different
    platforms.
    The current AbiWord font code is already using
    platform dependent APIs right?

    Andrew Dunbar.

    > Leonard
    > --
    >
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    > Leonard Rosenthol
    > <mailto:leonardr@lazerware.com>
    >
    <http://www.lazerware.com>

    =====
    http://linguaphile.sourceforge.net http://www.abisource.com

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