Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!columbia!rutgers!husc6!panda!genrad!decvax!tektronix!tekcrl!tekgvs!jerem From: jerem@tekgvs.UUCP (Jere Marrs) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga Subject: Re: PageSetter -- HELP Needed. Message-ID: <1973@tekgvs.UUCP> Date: Thu, 25-Dec-86 18:43:20 EST Article-I.D.: tekgvs.1973 Posted: Thu Dec 25 18:43:20 1986 Date-Received: Fri, 26-Dec-86 05:35:42 EST References: <7085@decwrl.DEC.COM> <3381@garfield.UUCP> Reply-To: jerem@tekgvs.UUCP (Jere Marrs) Organization: Tektronix, Inc., Beaverton, OR. Lines: 43 Keywords: PageSetter,Proportional spacing, kerning > >BTW, what exactly does the "kerning" selection in Font-Ed do? How does this >relate to presentation on the screen and/or printer? > >John I only recently learned this, so I have all of the arrogance of recent learning. The terms "kerning" and "proportional spacing" are often confused. Proportional spacing means that letters of narrower width are given proportionately smaller spacing and therefore fill space more efficiently and more aesthetically. An "i" takes fewer 'microspaces' than an "m." This is how typesetting differs from a normal typewriter. Back in the old days when type- setters used to cast their own Woods-Metal fonts for each publication, they found that when certain letters occurs in particular sequence, even more space can be used efficiently. For instance, if a 'V' occurs after an 'A', then they can be pushed closer together. So AV takes less space than it would if each letter were given the full number of microspaces attributed to it proportionally. If you imagine each letter in a rectangle whose width is equal to its number of microspaces, then kerning allows these rectangles to overlap. So, clearly, kerning requires that the actual sequence of the letters be taken in account in spacing. Proportional spacing considers only the next letter to be printed. I assume FontEd considers the sequence of letters and allows them to 'fit' together more closely. A computer and a laser printer (or other bit- mapping printers) are ideally suited for this. I thought that the person who observed that desk-top publishing (let's find another term) will require new things of editors and word processors, hit upon a fundamental truth. We will need programs that deal with text-formatting 'objects' rather than print pitch, margins, indentation, etc.. Such an object could be a paragraph, a header, an indented section, or graphics, etc.. We would then create a base of these objects and then assign them to spaces in the document, letting the formatting program worry about the details including the proportional spacing and kerning. It would be a more interactive, WYSIWYG troff. The graphic orientation would obviate the 'dot' directives. -Jere ----------------------