[XeTeX] Auto Font and Language Package in XeTeX (Khaled Hosny)

Michiel Kamermans pomax at nihongoresources.com
Wed Dec 22 12:41:26 CET 2010


On 12/21/2010 6:04 PM, Venkatesan. S.K. (TNQ) wrote:
> Do unicode committee have a proof of concept application (like Amaya 
> browser for W3  HTML) or a font?

They don't need a PoC application, as the algorithms are fully 
described. The problems usually occur when specific font features need 
to be applied in a specific order, and the font engine either lacks the 
capability to apply them in the right order, or the capability to apply 
them at all. Being Unicode and OpenType compliant (rather than just 
compatible) is a fiendishly complex job.

As for the font, the Unicode Consortium uses many different fonts, all 
contributed by numerous foundries and individuals (see 
http://unicode.org/charts/fonts.html)

> It is possible create a font using all their PDFs but license will be 
> problem, I suppose...

Rather! You are, in fact, expressly forbidden from extracting any font 
used in the Unicode specification PDF files.

> Each and every OS and editors show different levels of compliance...

This is mostly because they all use different engines. Your OS will use 
Uniscribe, Core Text or (most likely) Pango depending on whether it's 
windows, mac or *nix, and individual applications may completely ignore 
these render engines and use their own layout management and glyph 
fetchers instead.

Depending on how much the developers feel they need to reinvent the 
wheel because the default engines available don't offer what they need, 
applications will be more or less Unicode and OpenType compatible (I'm 
not aware of any text engine that is fully compliant, but if there is 
one, I'd love to know about it!)

- Mike "Pomax" Kamermans
nihongoresources.com



More information about the XeTeX mailing list