On 06/03/2009 03:28 PM, Ed Trager wrote:
Fontaine also overlaps with fontconfig and
pango in huge parts.
I'm not as convinced that fontaine overlaps so extensively with
fontconfig. The way orthographies are grouped in fontaine is quite
different than in fontconfig.
The treatment of Japanese illustrates the difference well: Fontaine
breaks up "Japanese" into a set of categories that are meaningful to
Japanese people: Jinmeiyo, Joyo, and Kokuji represent different
classes of Kanji, and then there is of course a separate group for
kana (hiragana, katakana). For a typographer working to produce a
Japanese font, being able to generate a report where things are
organized into these groupings makes sense. Fontconfig on the other
hand --correct me if I am wrong-- has a single grouping for "Japanese"
orthography, which lumps all the Kanji and kana. This is just one
example. There are differences in the approach fontaine takes for
other orthographies as well.
Overall, the general distinction is that fontaine uses
orthographic-centric groupings that are intended to be most relevant
to fonts and digital type design. As I understand it, fontconfig uses
language-centric groupings.
There is of course nothing wrong with fontconfig's approach -- or, for
that matter, with Fontaine's approach. They simply serve different
purposes.
I understand the difference. I'm not saying that the code that is out there
overlaps necessarily, but, my point is, there is a HUGE overlap in *scope*.
Very simple: If you need some code in font website, changes are very high that
you need the same code in your font dialog or font preview applications too.
So, I want to understand these needs such that we design a consistent, usable,
experience on the web as well as on the application level.
Cheers,
behdad
