Re: 8r fonts

[Sebastian Rahtz <s.rahtz@elsevier.co.uk>]

 > PERL provides nice features for reading binary files (VF and TFM
 > files) through pipes, for example:
not sure of the relevance. the vf and tfm files dont exist

 > So reading the metrics for all characters in a TFM file (your .mtx) and
 > the information in an encoding file (like 8r.enc) is not difficult.
but thats not what the .etx and .mtx files are

 > Macros do
 > form real pitfalls for programmers. That is the reason C++ has
 > abondoned them in favour of inline functions (whose use can be checked
 > at compile time). In PERL you can write powerfull functions.
hmm, better redo TeX in Perl as well then....

 > But perhaps you can think of more difficult issues?
yes, you havent addressed the issue! you have got to read and parse
Alan's definition of a glyph in Perl

 > In my opinion the benefits are:
 >  (1) better understandability
 >  (2) as a consequence a better maintainability
depends on who the reader is.

 >  (3) no postprocessing needed to generate checksums
true

 >  (4) PERL can use all memory your computer has onboard (no fixed arrays like
 >      TeX).
dont let Berthold see this. Y&Y has dynamic memory, so do Textures.
OzTeX and Web2c have config files to bump up memory. its not a
problem. *speed*  is the problem with fontinst

 > For most people TeX programming is like assembler programming. The
 > abstraction level is very low. TeX was never ment to be a general
sadly true. but we all know TeX already

 > be learned. That takes time (not that much as in TeX). If you decide to
 > rewrite fontinst in PERL I am willing to help you with the design.
but whats the incentive for Alan to take 3 months off his real work to
do fontinst again? 

sebastian