FOP: Fonts

FOP includes PFMReader, which reads the PFM file that normally comes with a Type 1 font, and generates an appropriate font metrics file for it. To use it, run the class org.apache.fop.fonts.apps.PFMReader:

Windows:

java -cp build\fop.jar;lib\avalon-framework.jar;lib\xml-apis.jar;
         lib\xercesImpl.jar;lib\xalan.jar
           org.apache.fop.fonts.apps.PFMReader pfm-file xml-file

Unix:

java -cp build/fop.jar:lib/avalon-framework.jar:lib/xml-apis.jar:
         lib/xercesImpl.jar:lib/xalan.jar
           org.apache.fop.fonts.apps.PFMReader pfm-file xml-file

FOP includes TTFReader, which reads the TTF file and generates an appropriate font metrics file for it. Use it in a similar manner to PFMReader. For example, to create such a metcis file in Windows from the TrueType font at c:\myfonts\cmr10.ttf:

java -cp build\fop.jar;lib\avalon-framework.jar;lib\xml-apis.jar;
         lib\xercesImpl.jar;lib\xalan.jar
           org.apache.fop.fonts.apps.TTFReader
             C:\myfonts\cmr10.ttf ttfcm.xml

TrueType collections (.ttc files) contain more than one font. To create metrics files for these fonts, you must specify which font in the collection should be generated, by using the "-ttcname" option with the TTFReader.

To get a list of the fonts in a collection, just start the TTFReader as if it were a normal TrueType file (without the -ttcname option). It will display all of the font names and exit with an Exception.

Here is an example of generating a metrics file for a .ttc file:

java -cp build\fop.jar;lib\avalon-framework.jar;lib\xml-apis.jar;
         lib\xercesImpl.jar;lib\xalan.jar
           org.apache.fop.fonts.apps.TTFReader -ttcname "MS Mincho"
             msmincho.ttc msminch.xml

You must tell FOP how to find and use the font metrics files by registering them in the FOP Configuration. Add entries for your custom fonts, regardless of font type, to the configuration file in a manner similar to the following:

<font metrics-file="FTL_____.xml" kerning="yes"
      embed-file="C:\myfonts\FTL_____.pfb">
  <font-triplet name="FrutigerLight" style="normal" weight="normal"/>
</font>

• Starting with FOP version 0.20.5 you can use URLs for the paths to the font files. Relative URLs are resolved relative to the fontBaseDir property (or baseDir) if available. See FOP: Configuration for more information.
• The "kerning" and "embed-file" attributes are optional. Kerning is currently not used at all. If embedding is off, the output will position the text correctly (from the metrics file), but it will not be displayed or printed correctly unless the viewer has the applicable font available to their local system.
• When setting the embed-file attribute for Type 1 fonts, be sure to specify the PFB (actual font data), not PFM (font metrics) file that you used to generate the XML font metrics file.

Font embedding is enabled in the userconfig.xml file and controlled by the embed-file attribute. If you don't specify the embed-file attribute the font will not be embedded, but will only be referenced.

When FOP embeds a font, it scrambles its fontname by inserting a prefix that ensures that the fontname will not match the fontname of an installed font. This is helpful with older versions of Acrobat Reader that preferred installed fonts over embedded fonts.

When embedding PostScript fonts, the entire font is always embedded.

When embedding TrueType fonts (ttf) or TrueType Collections (ttc), a new font, containing only the glyphs used, is created from the original font and embedded in the pdf. Currently, this embedded font contains only the minimum data needed to be embedded in a pdf document, and does not contain any codepage information. The PDF document contains indexes to the glyphs in the font instead of to encoded characters. While the document will be displayed correctly, the net effect of this is that searching, indexing, and cut-and-paste will not work properly.

One workaround for this behavior is to use the -ansi option when generating metrics with TTFReader. This will cause the whole font to be embedded in the pdf document. Characters will be WinAnsi encoded (as specified in the PDF spec), so you lose the ability to use characters from other character sets.