One solution to "Corrupted NFSS table" problem

[Don Robinson]

Although this reply goes beyond the topic mentioned in the subject line, one
approach I have taken to print documents with postscript figures is to open
the *.dvi file in DIVWINDO and make sure my spacing is OK, then print to
Acrobat Distiller.  I know, I know, Adobe Acrobat costs $240+ and we should
not have to incur this additional expense, but there are some benefits to
owning Adobe Acrobat (I do not own stock in Adobe).  You can tweak the text
and even change the font (postscript of course) or change its spacing and
even alter some graphics.  On another thread someone wanted to know about
positioning of arrowheads when using epic.  With Acrobat you can use a
graphic tool and select the arrowhead and move it around so that it looks
better (the line part of the arrow normally extends almost to the tip of the
arrowhead).

For about two years I have been producing graphics for inclusion in TeX
documents by using metapost.  You have almost as much control over a graphic
using metapost as you have over a formula using TeX (slight variations in
the font sizes is the only minor problem).  Metapost will produce figures as
postscript files that can be included in TeX documents.  When you print the
document to Acrobat Distiller you obtain a nice pdf file with the graphic.
The only problem I have encountered is that if your metapost graphic
contains font characters that are not in your TeX document already, they do
not appear in the pdf file.  At worst you could stick all the characters
used in the graph in an inconspicuous place in the TeX document and then use
Acrobat to delete them once the pdf file was produced.

I agree that it would be nice to view the figures in DVIWINDO or on
printouts without using Adobe Acrobat.  One final advantage of the Acrobat
approach is that you can print a pdf file to a non-postscript printer.
Sometimes shading that is uniform in a diagram appears as a halftone screen
but the curves and lines all look the same as on a postscript printer.

Regards,

Don

-----Original Message-----
From: Support for users of Y&Y's TeX system [mailto:YANDYTEX at LISTS.UCC.IE]
On Behalf Of Jochen Autschbach
Sent: Thursday, July 01, 2004 10:27 AM
To: YANDYTEX at LISTS.UCC.IE
Subject: Re: One solution to "Corrupted NFSS table" problem

On that topic: Is there any chance that such problems will ever get
fixed in a future update instead of just adding to a growing list of
things to fix after the installation fails?

Call me a heretic, but I think YandY need to provide some support that
goes beyond what a self-help group can offer. What I have seen so far,
most problems are related to the installation scripts and would not
involve bug-fixes in the YandY programs themselves.

By the way, I'm still wondering why DVIWINDO doesn't print postscript
figures to a postscript printer if the graphics has a TIFF preview (I
posted that a few months ago).

Regards,
Jochen