Bug#250216: More about TrueType support of dvips
On Sun, 23 May 2004, +17:37:00 EEST (UTC +0300),
Atsuhito Kohda <kohda@pm.tokushima-u.ac.jp> pressed some keys:
> From: Juhapekka Tolvanen <juhtolv@cc.jyu.fi>
> Subject: Bug#250216: More about TrueType support of dvips
> Date: Sun, 23 May 2004 01:57:25 +0300
> > I found these WWW-pages about Type42-fonts and conversion from TrueType
> > to Type42:
> > http://cgm.cs.mcgill.ca/~luc/type42.html
> > http://www.dcs.ed.ac.uk/home/jec/programs/xfsft/printing.html
> > I knew it: Type 42 is really a PostScript-wrapper over True Type-format.
> > Hence, conversion from TrueType to Type 42 can be really losless. And
> > maybe those Type 42-fonts can be embedded to PostScript-files.
> Before investigating the above, I'd like to know why
> you need PS output rather than PDF.
1) Having alternative ways of doing things is generally a good thing.
2) pdfTeX is not as bulletproof than normal TeX. Even me myself have
been able to create LaTeX-code that causes warnings or even errors in
pdflatex but works just fine when run through normal latex. What if
somebody wants to use such LaTeX code and same time embed some
TrueType-fonts to his/her LaTeX-code? (S)he is stuck!
3) What if somebody wants to use some TeX- or LaTeX-macro or -package
that for some reason does work at all in pdfTeX or pdfLaTeX? A package
called pstricks comes to my mind: Pages 28-29 of file
/usr/share/doc/texmf/pdftex/base/pdftexman.pdf.gz say:
"The inclusion of raw PostScript commands --a technique utilized
by for instance the pstricks package-- cannot be supported.
Although pdf is a direct descendant of PostScript, it lacks any
programming language commands, and cannot deal with arbitrary
PostScript."
Hence, having True Type-fonts and pstricks-package in same document is
awful situation as long dvips don't have good support for True Type
fons.
4) If dvips do not have good support for True Type-fonts, it won't do
well in competition with pdfTeX; People will consider it inferior and
obsolete.
5) Some papers are not meant to be released as PDF. Sometimes people
want just good PostScript-file that can be printed. If they later change
they mind, they can use ps2pdf of GhostScript.
> In case PDF I believe you can embed TrueType font with dvipdfm if you
> don't want to use PDFTeX/LaTeX.
At least aforementioned arguments 1, 4 and 5 still apply. Let's see, what
its documentation says. Aha! Page 20 of
/usr/share/doc/texmf/programs/dvipdfm.pdf.gz say:
"The raw PostScript "ps:" special supported by dvips and other
drivers. Only a few PostScript operators are supported; dvipdfm
does not include a complete PostScript interpreter. Complex
PostScript code, such as that embedded by the PSTricks package,
is not supported."
Hence, argument 3 still apply.
In the other words: pdfTeX and dvipdfm is not always an option.
--
Juhapekka "naula" Tolvanen * http colon slash slash iki dot fi slash juhtolv
"kohtalona perinnön on kirjastona roihuta kun lukutaidottomat säikkyy
ensipakkasta ja tuki kanssaihmisten on hyöty täysin ilmainen. vaan mitenpä
käy lempeyslainan palautuksessa?" CMX
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