11:04 AM me: Aoa
How are you
soroush.rabiei: hello
thank
you?
me: Fine, are u busy?
soroush.rabiei: not so much...
11:05 AM me: Ok. I am a hobby font developer from Pakistan
I have developed many naskh, nastaliq and koranic ligature-based fonts, and released them in public
11:07 AM I primarily use volt and font creator for my projects. For lookups, I asked my friend to write an application in C.sharp.
11:08 AM I was actually amazed how u wrote auto kerning, auto mark scripts for volt.
11:09 AM And so I got so much excited to chat with u :)
soroush.rabiei: Hmmm
11:10 AM actually I didn't write any script for VOLT
its impossible to develope simething under VOLT or change it
I used FontLab python scripting
11:11 AM me: I c.
soroush.rabiei: So how can I help you?
11:12 AM me: I was wondering, if it was possible to get the script u wrote for autokerning etc. And or if it can be made in to gui tool etc?
11:13 AM soroush.rabiei: It's too hard in FontLab to create gui...
You will have so many problems in FontLab
11:14 AM I suggest to use
FontForge instead
It has more powerful scripting features
I can send you my kerning script
11:15 AM It's python script of FontLab
But strongly recommend you not to use FontLab or VOLT...
It's time wasting
11:16 AM me: So, u mean, I should program everything in fontforge instead?
soroush.rabiei: yes
you can do everything in ff
11:17 AM OT features and design in one program...
and it's more flexible
11:18 AM Which OS you are using?
me: Alright. Btw, I read u were negative to FF a year ago
11:19 AM I am on win 7 ultimate 32-bit
soroush.rabiei: It was a year ago !!...
11:20 AM me: :). Also I read u were talking developing a whole new gui tool. But it seems u are happy with age old FF.
11:21 AM soroush.rabiei: Actually the ancient FF is very good ,...
but there is need to develop a new one
11:22 AM I couldn't managed to find guys to start development
so it ended before start...
11:23 AM there is a long time I didn't do font development (about 1 year)
I forget something ...
But can remember that
11:24 AM ff was best in everything
and its python scripting documentation was very bad :D
11:25 AM me: ok. tell me one more thing. before u went over to ff. U used volt. and the kerning script / macro u wrote somehow exported kern data to volt tables. how was this happening?
11:26 AM soroush.rabiei: As I remember
I wrote an script to create VOLT vgt files
(is it vgt?)
me: yes yes
11:27 AM soroush.rabiei: those files are in a regular languages in theoretical term
Ok now I can remember !
11:28 AM the script exports kerning values produced in FL to a temp file
then read that temp file and create VOLT feature files
11:29 AM then I opened VOLT and just import kern feature
(If I remember correctly...)
11:30 AM me: Great! And how accurate was this autokerning?
soroush.rabiei: that was hardest part !
11:31 AM first I used FC autokerning tool to produce kerning pair values
then, I found that that is not flexible enough
11:32 AM so start to write a new one from scratch with FLS
The script exported each glyph to bitmap then calls an external script for
11:33 AM overlaping bitmaps
and recognise kerning values
11:34 AM using an image processing algorithm ...
I was planing to do apply similar algorithm for mark placing
11:35 AM but have to break all my font development activities that time :(
me: why?
soroush.rabiei: I can send all files and programs for you
because of university.
11:37 AM let me find those files...
me: Thnx. Btw. Font creation is ur hobby or are u thinking real profession in the field some time in future?
11:40 AM soroush.rabiei: I don't have time to develop fonts ! and NO I don't think to do something in typography in the future ...
11:41 AM me: I c. So that those font making scripts / ideas were just a part of ur research.
11:45 AM soroush.rabiei: Ok I found them !
will send you now
just a minute ...
11:50 AM you have a mail !
me: Let me check
11:51 AM Got it. Wonderful.
Many thnx to u buddy
11:52 AM soroush.rabiei: you're welcome
12:02 PM me: Can these script run in fontforge just like fontlab?
12:03 PM soroush.rabiei: no
because ff sdk is different with fl sdk
12:04 PM I would like to convert and complete them for ff in holidays
12:06 PM me: wow, fantastic
12:07 PM if possible, write a comment corresponding each script / macro
soroush.rabiei: ok
12:11 PM me: I suppose FF can handle more than 25000 ligatures. Old FL and FC had stupid limits