Converting Type 1 fonts for use with Windows

Some Linux distributions like Red Hat and Suse have some fabulous Type 1 fonts for use that Windows users can really drool over. I especially like the URW and Chancery fonts.

If you want to use these fonts in Windows, hop over to the FontForge site and download FontForge. Open the font you wish to convert, select Generate, and choose to convert to either an OpenType or TrueType font. Drop the font in your fonts directory and you're home free. :)

Converting TTF for use with Linux/Unix apps

There are some apps on Linux/Unix that refuse to play nicely with TrueType or OpenType fonts. (The WxWindows library is one that gave me such headaches.) For such programs, the best bet is to convert the TTF to Postscript Type 1 fonts using TTF2PT1. There's even a version for Windows.

After installing TTF2PT1, convert the font to Type 1 using the command:
ttf2pt1 -a -e -llatin1 filename.ttf

For creating fonts for use with Ghostscript:
ttf2pt1 -a -b -llatin1 filename.ttf

You ought to have a files suffixed with .afm and .pfa (or .pfb for use with GhostScript) after the conversion completes.

Note that you should NOT do this if the font license disallows such a conversion.
Drop the font in the appropriate directory on Linux/Unix and from that directory, build the fonts.scale and fonts.dir file with
mkfontscale
mkfontdir.

If needed, add the directory to the X font path as mentioned in this tip.

Installing truetype fonts in Fedora Core/Red Hat and others

X Window supports many different types of fonts like Adobe Type 1 fonts, TrueType, or OpenType. If you need your OpenType/TrueType fonts accessible in Linux:

mkdir /usr/share/fonts/opentype

Copy the TrueType (.ttf) or OpenType (.otf) fonts into this folder. Now run
ttmkfdir -d /usr/share/fonts/opentype \
-o /usr/share/fonts/opentype/fonts.scale
mkfontdir /usr/share/fonts/opentype

Run chkfontpath to see if the directory we created (/usr/share/fonts/opentype) is present in the list of locations X Window will look for font files. If not, run:
chkfontpath -a /usr/share/fonts/opentype

If chkfontpath is not present, edit /etc/X11/fs/config or /etc/X11/xfs/config (whichever is present). Locate the lines

catalogue = /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/misc:unscaled,
/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi:unscaled,
/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi:unscaled,
/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Type1,
/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Speedo,
/usr/share/fonts/default/Type1,


To this, add /usr/share/fonts/opentype so that the content now appears like:
catalogue = /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/misc:unscaled,
/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi:unscaled,
/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi:unscaled,
/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Type1,
/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Speedo,
/usr/share/fonts/default/Type1,
/usr/share/fonts/opentype,


Now run:
fc-cache
fc-list

Check if the fonts added appear in the list. You can also run xfontsel to check the font list. For a font preview as well, run gucharmap.

If you add new fonts to this directory, run ttmkfdir, mkfontdir and fc-cache again.