Khaled Hosny wrote:
Currently, when defining a font feature one has to enable all features
by hand which is IMHO not very user friendly as it implies prior
knowledge about OpenType font features and the meaning of each one, not
every Arabic user, for example, knows what does 'init', 'medi, etc.
ligatures mean yet to know that he must enable them to get proper font
rendering.
I think some font features should be on by default, so that
\definefontfeature[script=arabic] should be enough to get an Arabic font
rendered correctly with the default features as its designer intended
(designers assume that certain will be on while other are off by
default, like liga vs. dlig), and if some one wants to disable a certain
default feature he can turn it off, not the reverse.
Microsoft's OpenType features list page
(http://www.microsoft.com/typography/otspec/features_ae.htm) gives a "UI
suggestion" for each feature noting if it should be on by default, I
think those are what most OpenType enable by default (at least the ones
I tested).
i've been thinking of a features=default option (as there is already
features=yes|no)
even then it can never be fully automatic as some usage of fonts (think
of verbatim) demands devation from defaults
now, if we implement a default list then we first need to make a
detailed list of what the supposed defaults are (and i'm not sure if ms
is the only resource for that; after all, not all machineries support
all features)
a related issue is that fonts can be used for different languages and
scripts and therefore a more dynamic feature switching might be needed
i.e. arabic might need init, but when the same font is used for latin it
not handy to have it enabled, so there might be a matrix of features /
scripts needed
if it was trivial i'd already done it -)
(implementing is trivial but i don't want to make the wrong decision
here as it will influence compatibility)
Hans
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Hans Hagen | PRAGMA ADE
Ridderstraat 27 | 8061 GH Hasselt | The Netherlands
tel: 038 477 53 69 | fax: 038 477 53 74 | www.pragma-ade.com
| www.pragma-pod.nl
-----------------------------------------------------------------
___________________________________________________________________________________
If your question is of interest to others as well, please add an entry to the
Wiki!
maillist : ntg-context@ntg.nl / http://www.ntg.nl/mailman/listinfo/ntg-context
webpage : http://www.pragma-ade.nl / http://tex.aanhet.net
archive : https://foundry.supelec.fr/projects/contextrev/
wiki : http://contextgarden.net
___________________________________________________________________________________
