mftrace.1

.TH MFTRACE 1 "January 23, 2007"
.\" Copyright (c) 1999--2007 by the authors
.\"
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.\" under the terms of the GNU General Public License.
.\"
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.\" Foundation, Inc.,
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.
.hw mftrace autotrace potrace fontforge ghostscript kpsewhich
.
.
.SH NAME
mftrace \- convert METAFONT format fonts into Type1 outline fonts
.
.
.SH SYNOPSIS
.B mftrace
.RI [ options ] " fontname"
.
.
.SH DESCRIPTION
.B mftrace
is a program that can convert a METAFONT font into a Type1 font.
It is simply called with the name of the font (without a `.mf' suffix)
and produces a Type1 font file called either
.IR \%fontname .pfa
or
.IR \%fontname .pfb
depending on the command line options.
With the help of
.BR fontforge (1)
it can produce other font formats too.
.
.P
For tracing the bitmap,
.B mftrace
either uses
.BR potrace (1)
or
.BR autotrace (1)
(the former preferred) if available; this can be overridden with the
.B \%\-\-autotrace
and
.B \%\-\-potrace
command line options.
.
.
.SH OPTIONS
This program follows the usual GNU command line syntax, with long
options starting with two dashes (`-').
.
.TP
.BR \-k ", " \-\-keep
Keep all output in directory `mftrace.dir'.
.
.TP
.BI \-\-magnification= MAG
The magnification to use for the PFA file.
The default is 1000.
The larger the magnification, the more precise the PFA file will be.
However, if the magnification is too large METAFONT can crash
with overflow errors.
.
.IP
Sadly, many MF fonts contain resolution checks
.
.RS
.IP
if dots_per_inch * design_size > 1500:
.RE
.
.IP
This check is susceptible to overflow errors.
Such code should be reported as a bug, and changed to
.
.RS
.IP
if dots_per_inch > (1500 / design_size):
.RE
.
.TP
.BI \-\-formats= FMT1 , FMT2 , .\|.\|.
Specify which formats to generate (default is pfa).
Choices are: `afm', `pfa', `pfb', `ttf', `svg'.
Note that
.B fontforge
must be installed to generate any format except `pfa' or `pfb'.
For generating `afm' you need either
.B fontforge
or
.BR ghostscript .
.
.TP
.B \-\-simplify
This passes the created Type1 font to
.B fontforge
to simplify and autohint it.
.
.TP
.BI \-\-gffile= FILE
Use generic font file
.I FILE
instead of running Metafont.
(GF is the default output format of Metafont.)
.
.TP
.BR \-I " " \fIDIR\fP ", " \-\-include= \fIDIR\fP
Add
.I DIR
to the current path for searching files.
.
.TP
.BI \-\-glyphs= LIST
Process only these glyphs.
.I LIST
is a comma separated list of decimal numbers or ranges, for example
`1-10,50,55,90-100'.
.
.TP
.BI \-\-tfmfile= FILE
Use
.I FILE
for the TFM file.
(The default is to use
.IR \%fontname .tfm).
.
.TP
.BR \-e " " \fIENC\fP ", " \-\-encoding=\fIENC\fP
Use encoding file
.IR ENC .
Encoding files used by
.B mftrace
are basically in the GhostScript/dvips format, but you may use a
special
.B \%\.notavail
glyph name in order to tell mftrace not to process a specific glyph.
If this option is not specified,
.B mftrace
tries to determine the encoding file automatically, from the
encoding specified in the TFM file, the default being `tex256.enc'.
.
.TP
.B \-\-keep-trying
Try to continue if external programs called by mftrace fail.
If METAFONT crashes with overflow errors, but nevertheless outputs
a GF file, try to process its output as is (useful for some buggy
fonts, see above).
If
.B potrace
or
.B autotrace
fail to trace a specific character, first try it with a less
smoothed curve, and if that fails, skip the character.
By default,
.B mftrace
leaves a file \%`trace-bug-\fIfont\fP-\fIchar\fP.pbm' and stops the
process with a request to file a bugreport.
.
.TP
.B \-\-dos-kpath
Try to use MikTeX's version of
.BR kpsewhich .
.
.TP
.B \-\-potrace
Use
.B potrace
for tracing bitmaps.
The default is to use
.B potrace
if it is found, otherwise to use
.BR autotrace .
.
.TP
.B \-\-autotrace
Use
.B autotrace
for tracing bitmaps.
.
.TP
.B \-\-no-afm
Don't read the AFM file to find font information.
.
.TP
.B \-\-noround
Do not round coordinates of control points to integer values (use with
.BR \-\-grid ).
Disabled by default.
.
.TP
.BI \-\-grid= GRID
Set reciprocal grid size in em units multiplied by ratio
magnification/1000.
For example,
.RB ` "\-\-grid\ 10 \%\-\-magnification\ 1000" '
rounds coordinates of control points to 1/10th of the em unit.
Useful simultaneously with the
.B \%\-\-noround
option.
Default
.I GRID
value is\~1, i.e., round to integer.
This option is only used with
.BR potrace .
.
.TP
.BI \-D,\-\-define= SYMBOL=VALUE
Set the font info
.I SYMBOL
to the given
.IR VALUE .
For example,
.B \%\-DFamilyName=Foo
sets the font family name to
.IR Foo .
.B mftrace
tries to fill in sensible default values for the
\%`FontName', \%`FamilyName', \%`FullName' and `Weight' fields.
.
.TP
.B \-V, \-\-verbose
Be verbose.
.
.TP
.B \-h, \-\-help
Show summary of options.
.
.TP
.B \-v, \-\-version
Show version of program.
.
.TP
.B \-w, \-\-warranty
Show warranty and copyright.
.
.
.SH COPYRIGHT
You may redistribute copies of mftrace under the terms of
the GNU General Public License <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>.
There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.
.br
This manual page is copyright \(co 2005,2006,2007 Julian Gilbey and is
distributed under the GNU General Public License too.
.
.
.SH "SEE ALSO"
.BR mf (1),
.BR autotrace (1),
.BR potrace (1),
.BR fontforge (1).
.
.
.SH AUTHOR
.B mftrace
was written by Han-Wen Nienhuys <hanwen@xs4all.nl>.
This manual page was originally written by Julian Gilbey <jdg@debian.org>
and has been revised by Werner Lemberg <wl@gnu.org>.
.
.\" EOF