This is an archive of CompuServe forum messages from 1985 to 1995, as saved in transcripts by John Foust.
Search Results (49 messages)
Hey Bill: LIGHTEN UP! Your drug company client is obviously just doing this to encourage you to develop an ulcer. They probably figure the $1,100 they've wasted will be recouped in ulcer medicine within two years (a fine payback schedule, worthy of the MBA the company probably has who is…
Thom: Every time! –jon
Brad: I've used Add/Strip going from IBM to Mac, but I forgot it can go the other way. De-Macify. Great word. –jon
Bill: Personally, the Mac's SMART QUOTES are driving me CRAZY! When I keep moving files off the Mac and into our Quadex system, they come across in QASCII as capped Rs and Ss, the em dash as cap Q, etc. and so forth. Keep telling myself to carve out some…
Earl: When you say there aren't any screen fonts to convert with the Royals, where does the font metric information reside? Is there something similar to the ATM file that Adobe uses, or is it somehow imbedded into the outline file? Also, everyone keeps talking about the Adobe Type 1…
Earl: Your comments on the morality of duplicating fonts for commercial use with Metamorphosis were interesting. I'm of several minds on this issue. First, as a typehouse employee, it's going to hurt. One of the reasons people come to big typehouses in the first place is our font library. Now,…
Thom: I always thought New Hampshire's slogan was "Ski Free or Die". At least that's what the downhill crew always told me. How could I possibly forget Frank Romano? I've gotten TypeWorld for years and watched as it went from seriously pooh-poohing PostScript to now thinking it's the best thing…
Brad: Any word yet on the kerning pair problem in Quark 2.12? I've still got 2.11 installed at work because I need the pair support, but I'm really getting used to the Xtras that I use at home (which don't work in 2.12). –jon
#The LaserLetter
Message #6031
Hi: Just received a sample copy of The LaserLetter in the mail today. It's suppose to be a monthly aimed at the "PostScript Imagesetting Community". (Gee, i didn't know we constituted a "community" already — can't wait 'til we're a town). Not badly done, but all the information on gray…
Steve: I think we'll be doing pretty much the same thing. I'll lurk around MACPRODUCT and MACDEV for several weeks before I'll use it in a production setting — I want to know as many of the pitfalls from someone else's experience as possible. Many of the System 7 features…
Steve: Tried using the split path option in the resolutions box and the file (a map of the world) was chopped at several wrong places. The entire Suez Canal was mistakenly filled, as was most of the Gulf of Mexico. I'm going to play with the flatness tomorrow. How high…
Mike: Zapf said he felt nobody had ever created a decent digital rendering of Optima and would only order it from hot metal typehouses when he used it. Guess that puts us cold type people in our place. –jon p.s. I'm just putting together a letter to Lino about all…
Beth Ann: Someone suggested Univers. I also like Trade Gothic (although the Adobe kerning pairs really need to be added to to do justice to that face). If you don't need a full family with condensed weights, check out Lucida Sans. The face was specifically designed for low-resolution devices and…
David: I'm not sure where I gave you the impression that I thought the anticipated Royals market would be in the low-rez arena. I think Apple is shooting the whole works with the Royals, hi-rez, low-rez and everything in between. I think people will convert fonts because I, personally, think…
Steve: Good news, indeed. I'll have to swipe the boss' copy of Seybold when he's not looking. I was talking to members of my local Mac users' group this weekend and one compatibility with System 7, not from any altruistic rationale, but because Apple felt if they didn't have ATM…
Tom: Update notes? Update notes? Why would anyone read the documentation that comes with a program ? My problem is with a 24-hour shop, documentation has a horrible habit of taking long walks, sometimes never to appear again. I'll look for the split path option in the Preferences menu. Thanks…
Steve: I'll give the flatness fix a try today. It's interesting that Freehand ups the flatness automatically. Hopefully, Adobe will do the same on the next revision. thanks for the suggestion. –jon
#Illustrator Files
Message #5811
All: I've got a customer who is sending in some fairly complex Illustrator files of late. The file runs fine his laserwriter IInt (and mine as well). It bombs out on the L300/RIP2 with an error involving the "fill" operator. If I save it as an Illustrator 1.1 file, import…
Tom: For my money, I'd say buy neither and pick another face. The basic problem is that Optima is just too subtle to render properly at 300 dpi. The Adobe font has two masters on it — one for low resolution, which doesn't even look like Optima to me –…
#Dup'ing font libraries
Message #5809
Dan: What's interesting to me, as someone involved in DTP only in the high-resolution area, if Altsys' Metamorphosis will be able to go down into an Adobe PS interpreter and bring back a font in Fontographer format, which can then be saved as a Royal font, why will anybody replace…
#Y U Would Want Royal
Message #5808
Thom: The whole idea of contacting font foundries last year for input and releasing Royal specs last May was to have a fairly sizable font library ready to go when System 7 is released. I'd say you will see Lino, Bitstream et al. ready with Royals as soon as Apple…
John: LOA can be reached at 415-841-6302 (8-1-N, running up to 9600 baud). The sysop there, Charles Collier, is a very knowledgeable fellow. It's mainly a West Coast crowd (lots of hot tub talk and such) but I noticed last time I was on they had elected David Geller (who…
Blaise: Obviously your message to Earl was mistakenly routed to me. Earl Allen's CIS number is used by a bunch of Altsys people (they have a forum in the APVEND section, by the way, which has some nice Fontographer examples including a freeware font called Crypt that's great for this…
Brad: Nah, I'm all conventioned out. Got to fly to Chicago next weekend for GraphX and the long awaited unveiling of Quadex on a Sun Workstation. Ta da! Had a long chat with one of Cg's product managers for the Sun. Sounds like a hell of a frontend if it…
Tripp: I know a few service bureaus that don't have the full Adobe library loaded on their RIPs because they use multiple libraries. One bureau has enough RIPs that they have Bitstream on one, Adobe on two others and are planning a fourth for URW. Another shop has all the…
Stephen: That's real interesting about the Type 1 fonts. So, beyond just straight hints, there may often be two masters. No wonder the Adobe fonts look so much better on low resolution machines (if the hints can't correct a problem face, they just load up a version optimized for low-rez…
Steve: Thanks a lot for the info on Parker's speech. I wonder if Adobe's bezier fonts could also be manipulated in a manner similar to that envision in a Royal "Level 3" font, given PostScript language extensions to handle such font manipulation, or if it is something that only the…
Carl: There's a group of utilities from Varityper that include one that will scan a pure PostScript file (a file printed to disc) and let you know all the fonts in the file (provided the code-generating application is well-behaved and didn't rename fonts for some reason). The particular utility is…
David: Where did you hear that Royal fonts "have provisions for defining size-specific features"? I remember hearing something similar a while back, but when I asked several people, including two of the guys coordinating the digitalization of the URW font library as well as the president of Monotype, everyone said…
David: By "most PostScript work is performed on the MAC" I meant that most of my shop's PostScript work is performed on the Mac. Thanks for the detailed answer. Do you know off hand if Birmy will be displaying its machines at GraphX in Chicago next week? The owner of…
Mike: Goudy Handtooled is available from the URW library. –jon
David: Does the Birmy handle Type 1 fonts from those type foundries that are producing hinted fonts but didn't by the rights from Adobe (like Bitstream and URW)? How does the Birmy interface to the Macs if virtually all your PostScript work is on the Mac environment and not IBM?…
David: I'm not really in the "job loop". Just thought that PostScript programming opportunity sounded interesting. If you E-plex me the info on the jobs, I'd be happy to post them on the New York Macintosh Users Group's BBS, which has a lot of very knowledgeable DTP-types popping in. However,…
Lon: The info I gave you on PSJ was in the latest issue. I assume it's up-to-date. –jon
Quinn: I think I've got some bad news for you. You can't just re-encode the PostScript fonts on the LaserWriter because those fonts don't have the characters for the IBM extended character set. PostScript fonts come with a maximum of 255 characters. The basic character sets don't include comparable box…
I agree wholeheartedly with your statement. However, I think you're letting Warnock off the hook too easily. If he had thrown open the standard a year ago, this whole Royal stuff probably wouldn't have happened in the first placed. Of course, I'm sure the economics of opening PostScript is driving…
At the New York PostScript User's Group meeting on Monday night, the two Adobe reps said they had no word on SPS membership. I keep getting the feeling that Adobe feels that if it throws open the full specifications on PostScript that everyone will feel so grateful that they'll allow…
#12986-
#Benguiat & good type
Message #13006
What, we agree??!! I must have died and gone to heaen! Oh, by the way. Just saw your quote in the MacWeek article on the Altsys program that converts Type 1 fonts to editable PostScript letterforms. Did you, or did you not, when I suggested that PostScript type foundries needed…
It would be a blessing if Adobe cooperates with SPSS. Prior to Seybold, I was envisioning three PostScript standards — Adobe and their licensees, SPSS and their clone cohorts and whatever Apple/Microsoft decide to do to interface Royal with PostScript. At least getting the clone world and Adobe together would…
I know you're probably up to your eyes in non-disclosure forms, but please keep us informed about anything you can talk about. The Adobe ROM upgrade is good news. It always drives me crazy when I try to kern type in straight PostScript code. The awidthshow, ashow and kshow operators…
Bill: I usually send my commands to the 890 in a separate file before I run another job, but they can be embedded into the Postscript code of any existing job. I have stripped in hopper and paper size commands in Adobe Illustrator files and also changed device-specific parameters, but…
Edward: Stymie, to the best of my knowledge, hasn't been released. But you might try looking at Memphis. It's got the Stymie feel, and it comes in 4 weights. — Jon
Richard: I've used the following code to switch my NEC 890 with good results: statusdict begin 2 setpapertray legaltray (or lettertray, depending on paper size) end I just send it using PostHaste or PS-Send and I haven't had a problem. To switch back, just change the 2 to a 1.…
Listen, I don't want to get into a big fight about this, but how can you say Adobe isn't the industry standard for fonts in DTP? Name me a service bureau that carries CG and Bitstream fonts that doesn't carry Adobe. Since Adobe cut the deal where Linotype is now…
Nicely put defense of Adobe. I think you're right on. With the pricing I've seen on the new CG Postscript machines (which are using an Adobe-sanctioned RIP) I think Birmy is in serious trouble. Why purchase a Birmysetter that can't run the Adobe fonts (which whether David likes it or…
Lino Printing
Message #7238
Concerning the size problem: Welcome to the Wonderful World of Postscript! The fact that Postscript points and printers points don't match is a source of continual aggravation. If you're writing a Postscript program, it's fairly easy to compensate by rescaling the job by including the line 72 72.27 div 72…
Lasertalk is sold by Emerald City Software. Their address is Emerald City Software 97 Jennings Lane Atherton, CA 94025 (415) 368-8303 Last time I checked, the PC version was being shipped in December. Hope this helps.
AFM vs. PFM query
Message #6594
I was wondering if any of the Postscript mavens in the forum could explain something to me. A typical Adobe font package comes with three files, extensions .fon, .pfm, .pfb. I gather from the size of the files, .fon's are the screen fonts, .pfb are the printer fonts and .pfm's…
Do you have any additional information on the PC version of LaserTalk? I've seen their ads and drooled at bit (not a pretty sight!). Right now I write some Postscript code in my text editor, copy it down to the laser printer and run over to my communications package to…