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At 09:16 2/22/2003 +0000, Robin Fairbairns wrote:

> > >>>>> "Thomas" == Thomas Esser <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> >
> >     > As other have guessed: I don't like that europs approach as the
> >     > type1 files cannot be distributed with teTeX.
> >
> > On the other hand there is support for Y&Y's Lucida fonts which are
> > not free as well.
>
>and the steady stream of complaints to y&y (who are merely selling
>agents: bigelow and holmes designed the fonts), and on comp.text.tex,
>is evidence of the trouble caused by having metrics but no fonts.

Bigelow and Holmes indeed designed the fonts. In the case of the
math fonts for TeX there was considerable iterative interaction with
Y&Y to get them to actually be useable with TeX, since TeX makes
weird and wonderful demands on fonts (and lies about metrics in
the TFM, just for example). In additions, Y&Y
generated the metrics and paid for development of the style files
(in addition to writing support code for plain TeX and LaTeX 2.09
before there was PSNFSS).  They also bear the brunt of questions
relating to systems that have trouble supporting scalable outline fonts
well.

Math fonts for use with TeX are a nightmare when compared to the
thousands of plain text fonts that Adobe et al sell license for. There
are never any questions about those.  A vendor has to be brave(or
insane) to enter the very difficult and very limited world of math fonts
for use with TeX.

Also, I suspect people who are unwilling to pay license fees to Y&Y for
fonts would similarly not want to pay license fees to Bigelow and Holmes or
Michael Spivak (all nice people who would rather not want to deal with sales,
marketing, TeX code development and support).

>the situation is of course even worse for lucida, because several
>subsets of the fonts exist (many of them "free", in the sense that
>they are bundled for use with other packages) that look sub-standard
>if used in tex.

No good deed goes unpunished.  The "free" text fonts that are similar
are just that: similar, not equal. If you want the real thing and support
you need to get the real thing.  And there are no "free" equivalents of the
math font part of the complete.  It's hard to fault a well designed working
set of fonts for the faults of free fonts that appear superficially related.

(For a real kick in the pants, look at the free "math fonts" that come
with Mathematica).

> > I'm not sure whether it is the most user friendly way to provide the
> > support files along with teTeX,  it is probably quite convenient for
> > people who have the Lucida fonts already installed.
>
>"for the minuscule proportion of people who have the lucida fonts..."

The support files for LucidaBright and MathTime are but a microscopic
drop in the bucket of the bloated distribution. There is plenty of stuff
in there that takes up several megabytes and I don't use and I don't
know anyone else that uses.

> > Installing the 'real' fonts shouldn't be difficult, but it might be a
> > bit inconvenient.  You have to find out what you need, find out where
> > it is on the disk, where the files should go, create the appropriate
> > directories and, because the Y&Y stuff is based on WinDOS, you have to
> > keep in mind that file names are case sensitive under UNIX.
>
>installing the adobe euro fonts (to get back to the point at issue) is
>the *only* tricky issue in the matter, for most tex users: widnoze
>users will merely ask for the package to be installed, and it will
>happen.  getting and installing the font is (imo) a big deal: it's a
>bundle of files with stupid names, and there are no package managers
>that will just stick them in place.

The advantages of systems that makes font installation and use
easy should be blatantly apparent...

>y&y doesn't (berthold doesn't believe in the tds anyway, apparently
>feigning not to understand why people don't just use the "vastly
>superior" widnoze filing system and y&y tex's flat directory model).

Not sure where this comes from.  When you get a Y&Y TeX System
you have a "deep" directory tree with all the usual stuff, except
for the legacy METAFONT and PK font related branches snipped off.

When it comes to fonts, you should only need the actual font files (PFB)
and there is no point in building a hierarchy for that.

>personally, i would rather not have any of these commercial fonts in
>the base distributions (including tetex).

Well, you only have the "free" metric files and style files...

>i believe they merely add
>to the feeling that so many people have, that "fonts in tex are deeply
>obscure" (far worse than merely difficult).

Sorry, but they are. Certainly when compared to systems that support
fonts well such as Textures on the Mac and Y&Y TeX in Windows.

>we really need a tetex package manager; then the bundles for these
>fonts can refuse to install if the .pf[ab] isn't available.  but
>that's another argument...



--
Berthold K.P. Horn mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.ai.mit.edu/people/bkph 
(BK) 

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