#Y U Would Want Royal
3 messages in this thread
If, as you and I both seem to think, the Royal market will be a low-res
market, why would users want to convert their PostScript fonts (or vice
versa), given the subsequent probable loss of hinting? And why convert your
fonts to Royal if they still work on your PS printer? Buyers are going to
have to go one way or the other, it doth seem. And, again, in the short
run, the big seller will be price. If, as Dan suggests, Royal fonts are
going to be _harder_ to manufacture than PS Type 1 fonts, Apple and
Microsoft are going to have to be willing to give Royal a substantial
subsidy to get it established in the market. Apple may be "saving" however
many millions it was paying to Adobe, but could end up "losing" just as
much to market Royal fonts. Although, I agree that when things settle down
(if they ever do) prices will be nearly identical.
Which means that, in the long run, the issue is going to be features and
flexibility. So far, the portability issue is a non-issue. Royal doesn't
seem to be any more or less portable than PS type.
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 problems
will develop using fonts in a mixed Royal/PostScript environment and heavy
font users will just convert their fonts so they're all either Royals or
PostScript (when you're trying to isolate problems running jobs, who needs
to introduce font format problems if they don't have to).
Apple, of course, says the font usage will be transparent so users won't
have to convert. As someone heavily involved in DTP, I'm curious about the
Line Layout Manager that will eventually be part of System 7 (although,
according to MacWeek, it won't ship in the initial release). Among other
goodies, LLM will allow support for hung punctuation. Will that work with
PS fonts or only Royals? If both, fine. If only Royals, I, as an ad
typographer, will be converting my PS library to Royals because I need hung
punctuation.
It's the new System 7 features, I think, which is where the user will see a
difference in Royals and PostScript fonts.
–jon
Sorry, if I misinterpreted you. Looking back over the messages, I think my
misunderstanding had something to do with the probable loss of hinting when
converting fonts Royal <-> PS.
If the Line Layout Manager is part of the operating system, shouldn't it
work with _any_ kind of fonts the system is using? I also note Apple's
"decision" to let System 7 support ATM. That seems to indicate to me that
LLM features would be available for PS fonts. Of course, I'm not up on all
this technical stuff about System 7, but that's the impression I get. (And
automatically hung punctuation will be nice to have, although I personally
do not do that much work that requires it.) But I guess Apple could build
in features that would only be useable by Royal fonts. (Which, if Microsoft
doesn't build the same features into OS/2 and the Presentation Manager,
might make OS/2 users a bit miffed if they think that because they're using
the same font technology, they should get the same features.)
More speculation: for the same reason System 7 is supporting ATM, I would
venture that almost every feature would have to be useable by PS fonts,
just so Apple doesn't end up alienating those of us who have put a
substantial investment into PS fonts. But if conversion is necessary and is
quick, easy and maintains high fidelity (which is not certain), then I
would hope that Apple would make a PS to Royal conversion utility available
at a minimal cost, if they want to lure us to Royal. And, if that's the
case, then decisions would only have to be made on new acquisitions, since
our old type libraries can be converted.
Which brings me to the next question: How necessary is it that Apple
market new Royal fonts (i.e. fonts which have no Adobe counterpart) in
order to grab some immediate market?