[XeTeX] XeTeX and microtype-package…

Sat Jan 2 22:47:21 CET 2010

Dear Mike,

thanks a lot for your detailed e-mail. Not very encouraging though… I  
would have to think about how to solve this problem for me now. As I  
have got really no expertise at all, but I am sure that I want to work  
the way with LyX I do up to now. Maybe I’m going to finish my more  
important documents in InDesign – which I have used for a long time.  
Latex’ ability to provide margin alignment was one of the reasons why  
I switched and started working with LyX.

Best
Jess

Am 02.01.2010 um 13:39 schrieb Michael Lynch:

> Dear Jess,
>
> OpenType fonts (and possibly AAT fonts too) allow the inclusion of  
> different features. One of these is an optical bounds table which  
> can be included as part of OpenType fonts by the developer (see http://www.microsoft.com/OpenType/otspec/features_ko.htm#opbd) 
> , which would describe for individual glyphs how far they should  
> protrude to achieve proper optical margins. Currently, I believe  
> very few fonts (possibly none!) support this feature. Certainly,  
> none of the fonts I have seem to have these tables.
>
> The second half of the problem is that the layout engine needs to  
> support this feature. XeTeX does not currently allow for this, and  
> as I understand, there is no simple way to port the code used in  
> pdfTeX due to the different internals of XeTeX. I've seen mention  
> that LuaTeX will support this feature and the micro-typographic  
> features currently available in pdfTeX, but I'm not sure what it'll  
> do when fonts don't contain the required features.
>
> (At the moment, pdfTeX with the microtype package is in the  
> advantageous position that typically, a relatively small set of  
> fonts are used. It comes with settings for a basic set of fonts (see http://www.tex.ac.uk/tex-archive/macros/latex/contrib/microtype/microtype.pdf 
> , page 21), and if other fonts are used, I think generic values are  
> used instead. I don't think this would be a reasonable option for  
> XeTeX given the variety of fonts often used.
> The only other program that I know of that supports optical margins  
> is Adobe InDesign (excepting the hz-program, which I don't think is  
> widely available). Looking at it, it clearly implements them  
> somehow, but since the tables don't exist in fonts I don't know what  
> it does. By way of pure speculation, it may also use generic values  
> or possibly try to calculate its own values for the optical bounds  
> from the glyphs themselves. I don't even know if it uses the correct  
> values if the font happens to provide them, but I guess that at  
> least could be tested relatively easily.)
>
> I'm afraid none of this is very much help for you. Unfortunately the  
> feature you want is not currently supported by XeTeX, and even if it  
> was added to tomorrow, most fonts don't support it anyway. Sorry for  
> the rather long response but I hope this clears it up at least.
>
> Regards,
>
> Mike
>
> (If you have the expertise to add it, from previous responses on the  
> list, I think you'd make a lot of people happy! We'd also need some  
> sort of mechanism to specify a mechanism where these values could be  
> specified separately. This would rather complicate the situation,  
> but given that not all fonts' licenses allow modifications to be  
> made, I think it's the only reasonable way to make it work. Even if  
> these modifications were allowed, it would make documents  
> dramatically less portable, as they would depend on locally modified  
> fonts with the added opbd tables, rather than just specifying extra  
> settings which made it clear that these were additional features.)
>
> On 02/01/2010 08:04, jezZiFeR wrote:
>> Dear Pete,
>>
>> thank you. The reason why I want to use micro-typography is because  
>> I want to have the margins aligned. I especially don´t like the  
>> hyphens inside of the text. You mentioned the »opbd table« which  
>> would allow optical alignment – is it the optical alignment of the  
>> outer margin, which is meant? What is »opbd table«, and how could I  
>> use it?
>>
>> Thanks again, best
>> Jess
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Am 01.01.2010 um 23:25 schrieb Peter Dyballa:
>>
>>>
>>> Am 01.01.2010 um 22:18 schrieb jezZiFeR:
>>>
>>>> Is there any solution to this?
>>>
>>> Somewhen in this millennium, presumingly earlier.
>>>
>>>> Are there any more information on this topic?
>>>
>>>
>>> Yes, there might be a dozen threads on this topic in XeTeX  
>>> mailings archive, I think here: http://tug.org/mailman/listinfo/xetex 
>>> . XeTeX uses features built into the font while the microtype  
>>> package uses some "external" information. Almost a year ago, in  
>>> February, Adam Twardowsky mentioned the opbd table, which, if  
>>> implemented, would allow font protrusion and the rand table  
>>> "optical/grey value alignment."
>>>
>>>
>>> Why would you like to use XeTeX with micro-typography?
>>>
>>> -- 
>>> Greetings
>>>
>>> Pete
>>>
>>> There are very few jobs that actually require a penis or vagina.  
>>> All other jobs should be open to everybody.
>>>                – Florynce Kennedy
>>>
>>>
>>>
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