Hi Folks, I haven't done much with TXT2PDF for like 3 years(!), but I finally got the itch to play with it again and have added 2 new features that ppl have asked for in the past:
TrueType font embedding Unicode mapping The first one, of course, allows you to use most TrueType fonts in your PDFs. Just upload them to the mainframe as variable record files and use the new XFONT parameters. Aside from the obvious benefit of being able to spiff up the reports even more, you also get proper character spacing for proportional fonts. And yes, barcode fonts should be usable too. Font subsetting will be available in the next release. I added the Unicode mapping option to use in combination with the font embedding as it allows you to map single byte characters to any unicode character. I chose to use the UCM file format since there are many well maintained ones at www.icu.org. But, half way through adding the mapping option, I realized that it could also be used instead of the character translation tables that can be fed to TXT2PDF to allow converting input text from one codepage to one usable in a PDF. This would mean that the input text would no longer be converted...it would remain exactly the same as the original input. The mapping would be embedded within the PDF and the viewer (Acrobat Reader) would do the translation before display. So, my question is should I allow for this type of usage? If so, should I remove the translation tables entirely or should I give the user the option of using either one or both? I guess another couple of questions would be to ask if anyone even uses TXT2PDF anymore and if they have ever mucked about with the translation tables? Thanks, Leland
