otf2bdf - Man Page

otf2bdf [options] font.{ttf,otf}

otf2bdf will convert an OpenType font to a BDF font using the Freetype2 renderer (http://www.freetype.org).

otf2bdf accepts the following command line arguments:

-v

print warning messages when the font is converted.

-n

disable glyph hinting.

-p n

set the desired point size (see default value by running the program with the -h option).

-et

display a list of the platforms and encodings available in the font. The default values, compiled into the program, are a platform of 3 (Microsoft) and encoding of 1 (ISO10646). If the font does not contain the default platform and encoding, the fallback will be the Apple ISO10646 encoding.

-r n

set both the horizontal and the vertical resolution (see default value by running the program with the -h option).  The minimum is 10dpi and the maximum is 1200dpi.

-rh n

set the horizontal resolution (see default value by running the program with the -h option).  The minimum is 10dpi and the maximum is 1200dpi.

-rv n

set the vertical resolution (see default value by running the program with the -h option).  The minimum is 10dpi and the maximum is 1200dpi.

-o outfile

sets the output filename (default output is to stdout).

-pid id

set the platform id for selecting the character map (see default value by running the program with the -h option).

-eid id

set the encoding id for selecting the character map (see default value by running the program with the -h option).

-c c

set the character spacing.  This should be one of `P' for proportional, `M' for monospace, or `C' for character cell.  By default, the spacing of a font will be automatically determined to be either `M' or `P' according to values provided in the font.

-f name

set the foundry name used in the XLFD name.  The default value is `Freetype'.

-t name

set the typeface name used in the XLFD name.  By default, otf2bdf will attempt to get a name from the font first and then it will use the name supplied with this command line option, and if all else fails, it will use the name `Unknown'.

-w name

set the weight name used in the XLFD name.  If this value is not supplied, the default value is assumed to be `Medium'.  Some common values for this are `Thin', `Delicate', `ExtraLight', `Light', `Normal', `Medium', `SemiCondensed', `Condensed', `SemiBold', `Bold', `Heavy', `ExtraBold', and `ExtraHeavy'.

-s name

set the slant name used in the XLFD name.  If this value is not supplied, the default value is assumed to be `R', for Roman.  Some common values for this are `R' for Roman, `I' for Italic, `O' for Oblique, `RI' for Reverse Italic, and `RO' for Reverse Oblique.

-k name

set the width name used in the XLFD name.  The default is `Normal'.

-d name

set the additional style name used in the XLFD name.  The default is an empty string.

-u char

set the character used to replace the dashes/spaces in a font name.  The default is the space character.

-l subset

define a list of character codes which will be used to select a subset of glyphs from the font.  The syntax of the subset string is the same as the syntax for selecting subsets in X11 XLFD font names.  Example:

% otf2bdf -l '60 70 80_90' font.ttf -o font.bdf

The command above will only generate the glyphs for codes 60, 70, and 80 through 90 inclusive.  Glyphs that are not in the subset are not generated.

-m mapfile

specifies a mapping file which will reencode the BDF font when it is generated.  Any glyphs with codes that do not have a mapping will not be generated.

The remapping file should begin with two lines, one which starts with REGISTRY followed by the character set registry and one which starts with ENCODING followed by the encoding.  An example from the iso8859.2 file:

REGISTRY ISO8859
ENCODING 2

The remapping data should be two columns of hexadecimal numbers, separated by spaces or tabs.  The first column should have the code which should be used in the BDF font.  The second column should be the hexadecimal code of the glyph in the "cmap" table otf2bdf is using.  An example mapping file is provided which will map fonts from Unicode (the default "cmap" table) to ISO8859-2.

Unicode is not the only option.  If you choose another platform and encoding ID on the command line, then the remapping is assumed to map from the chosen platform and encoding to some other character set.

gbdfed(1), xfed(1), bdftopcf(1), bdftosnf(1), bdfresize(1)
Glyph Bitmap Distribution Format (BDF) Specification, Application Note 5005, Adobe System Inc, 1993
X Logical Font Description Conventions, X Consortium

The FreeType project for providing the renderer!
Robert Wilhelm <robert@physiol.med.tu-muenchen.de> for pointing out a crucial problem with the pre-1.0 code.
Lho Li-Da <ollie@ms1.hinet.net> for problem reports.
Adrian Havill <havill@threeweb.ad.jp> for unintentionally pointing out a missing feature.
Richard Verhoeven <rcb5@win.tue.nl> for problem reports and patches.
Choi Jun Ho <junker@jazz.snu.ac.kr> whose implementation provided some nice new features.
Pavel Kankovsky <peak@kerberos.troja.mff.cuni.cz> for providing some critical metrics fixes and other improvements.
Matti Koskinen <mjkoskin@sci.fi> for pointing out a problem.
Eugene Bobin <gene@ftim.ustu.ru> for mapping tables.
Oleg N. Yakovlev <yashka@optima.dnepropetrovsk.ua> for pointing out a problem.
Bertrand Petit <elrond@phoe.frmug.org> for additional functionality.
Roman Czyborra <czyborra@cs.tu-berlin.de> for pointing out some problems.
Mike Blazer <blazer@mail.nevalink.ru> for some Window's compilation advice.
Solofo Ramangalahy <solofo@mpi-sb.mpg.de> for contributing some mapping tables.
Antoine Leca <Antoine.Leca@renault.fr> for mapping table suggestions.
Patrick Hagglund <patrik.hagglund@bredband.net> for Freetype2 patches.
Christos Tountas <cvt@sprynet.com> for finding problems.
Nelson Beebe <beebe@math.utah.edu> for finding problems.
"Prophet of the Way" <afu@wta.att.ne.jp> for finding a problem.

Mark Leisher
Computing Research Lab
New Mexico State University
Email: mleisher@crl.nmsu.edu