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From: eijkhout@s41.csrd.uiuc.edu (Victor Eijkhout)
Newsgroups: comp.text,comp.text.desktop
Subject: Re: Proper usage of "font", "face", "family"
Message-ID: <1991May1.194107.7414@csrd.uiuc.edu>
Date: 1 May 91 19:41:07 GMT
References: <1991May1.154018.3623@watdragon.waterloo.edu> <1991May1.172153.6437@csrd.uiuc.edu> <1991May1.181455.24640@beaver.cs.washington.edu>
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graham@june.cs.washington.edu (Stephen Graham) writes:

>In article <1991May1.172153.6437@csrd.uiuc.edu> eijkhout@s41.csrd.uiuc.edu (Victor Eijkhout) writes:

>>typeface: set of lettershapes (e.g., Palatino Bold)
>>family of typefaces: set of typefaces that belong together (Palatino)
>>font: one typeface in one specific size, and (important!)
>>   for some specific machine (Palatino Bold on a 300dpi Postscript engine).

>The definition of font in this case is too restrictive. Perhaps it would
>be better to say that a font is:

>one typeface in a specific size and for some specific page description
>program (e.g., Palatino Bold implemented in PostScript).

>However, this runs into problems since PostScript (and other outline) fonts
>do not specify a particular type size. In this case, the only time you
>could refer to a type font is between the printer's raster device and
>the page. At all other times, you simply have a typeface.

>Therefore, the term font is correctly used for computer generated type
>when applied to a typeface implemented using bitmaps.

Not quite. The term 'font' (old spelling 'fount') has the
connotations of 'the way a typeface looks once it has been
cast (yes! lead!) for a specific typesetter'.
And the Postscript fonts have a lot of characteristics of
this: the way certain features suddenly disappear for
small sizes, the way curves are rendered.

But I admit that this is a muddled issue, and
that standards for terminology are simply non-existent.
We may be glad that the days when every point size had
a name of its own are over...

Victor.