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	["1283" "Thu" "29" "February" "1996" "11:55:56" "GMT" "Philip Taylor (RHBNC)" "CHAA006@alpha1.rhbnc.ac.uk" nil "28" "Re: Additional font dimensions for text fonts" "^Date:" nil nil "2" nil nil nil nil]
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Date:         Thu, 29 Feb 1996 11:55:56 GMT
From: "Philip Taylor (RHBNC)" <CHAA006@alpha1.rhbnc.ac.uk>
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Subject:      Re: Additional font dimensions for text fonts
Status: R
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>> The dc fonts currently contain 6 additional font dimensions, namely
>> def font_character_set expr x = fontdimen  8: x enddef;
>> def font_baselineskip  expr x = fontdimen  9: x enddef;
>> def font_acc_height    expr x = fontdimen 10: x enddef;
>> def font_cap_height    expr x = fontdimen 11: x enddef;
>> def font_asc_height    expr x = fontdimen 12: x enddef;
>> def font_rule_thickness expr x = fontdimen 13: x enddef;
>> They are currently undocumented, and the first one (font_character_set)
>> looks already like a failure (font dimensions get scaled, if the font
>> is scaled).

Not sure if you missed my earlier post on this thread, but I suggested
using font dimen _ratios_ to indicate non-scalable metrics such as character
set.

But to further pursue these ideas (which I strongly support):

1) Does `character set' also imply `encoding vector'?  (By which I mean
   can I be sure that every font with character set C1 has equivalent
   glyphs in all 256 positions, or only that it has the C1 character
   set with no additional semantics concerning the placement of
   individual glyphs?)

2) Is it wise to over-load the font dimens from 8 to 22?  Should these
   not be left for their maths semantics, and font dimens _above_ 22
   used for your new data?

** Phil.