User Guide

Making OpenType Fonts

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O p en T yp e Fo nt s

In this chapter we will discuss working with the OpenType fonts. The

OpenType font format, jointly developed by Microsoft and Adobe, allows

us to combine the best features of the TrueType and Type 1 font formats.

For the end user there is little difference between OpenType and TrueType

fonts: both are stored in a single font file, both are Unicode-encoded and

Windows and Mac OS directly support both.

The real difference is the support of font features that is provided by the

OpenType font format. Font features, which can be script and language-

dependent, can define behaviours of the font, which allow better

typographic layout, and precise support of complex scripts.

For detailed OpenType specification and other documents please refer to

this page:

http://www.microsoft.com/typography/otspec/default.htm

A good document covering OpenType glyph processing in Windows is:

http://www.microsoft.com/typography/developers/opentype/default.htm