Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!bloom-beacon!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!osu-cis!killer!dcs!wnp
From: wnp@dcs.UUCP (Wolf N. Paul)
Newsgroups: comp.text
Subject: Re: Definition of Point
Message-ID: <224@dcs.UUCP>
Date: 19 Oct 88 05:57:07 GMT
References: <2610015@hpsal2.HP.COM> <30767@bbn.COM> <217@dcs.UUCP> <642@sas.UUCP>
Reply-To: wnp@dcs.UUCP (Wolf N. Paul)
Organization: DCS, Dallas, Texas
Lines: 29

In article <642@sas.UUCP> bts@sas.UUCP (Brian T. Schellenberger) writes:
>In article <217@dcs.UUCP> wnp@dcs.UUCP (Wolf N. Paul) writes:
>|  in a font, generally pointsize is considered to refer to the sum of x-height
>|  (i.e. the height of the lower case x and by inference of most l.c. chars.),
>|  descenders, and ascenders or (cap height - x height), whichever is larger.
>Does the height of a parenthesis work well as an approximation?  I ask
>because this is one that is suggested by Knuth.

If Knuth says it, it's well worth listening to. I guess it depends on the font
design. In most cases parentheses would be as tall as the ascenders; whether
it reaches below the baseline sufficiently to be used as an indicator of
pointsize depends on the design of the font.

I should also pass on what some have pointed out to me: in the traditional world
of movable (lead) type, point size refers to the height of the slug on which
the letters of a given font are mounted, not necessarily to any measurable
feature of the printed image. Thus, you could have tiny characters mounted
on a 28pt. slug and it would be considered -- technically -- a 28pt. font.

But I suggest that for practical purposes, and in a computerized environment
where characters in a font are not mounted on slugs :-) my definition
works well enough.

Wolf

-- 
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