Path: utzoo!utgpu!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!ames!pasteur!ucbvax!bloom-beacon!mit-eddie!mit-amt!phil
From: phil@mit-amt (Phil Sohn)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: What are Adobe AFM files for?
Message-ID: <3519@mit-amt>
Date: 25 Jan 89 04:37:25 GMT
References: <3536@ucdavis.ucdavis.edu>
Reply-To: phil@media-lab.media.mit.edu (Phil Sohn)
Distribution: na
Organization: MIT Media Lab, Cambridge MA
Lines: 20

In article <3536@ucdavis.ucdavis.edu> u545731798ea@deneb.ucdavis.edu (Greg DeMichillie) writes:
>I've been using several Adobe fonts for a while and I still am not sure
>what the heck the Adobe Font Metric (AFM) files are for.  Are they used 
>to better display the fonts on the screen or just when printing?

	Neither, they contain information about character bounderies
and widths and things.  You only need them if you are in some very
special cases.  The only program that uses them (to my knowledge)
is a afm<->tfm converter.  (AFM = Adobe Font Metric, TFM = TeX
Font Metric.)  MacTeX then uses the tfm files.

>Basically, I work on 2 systems, only 1 of which is connected to a 
>LaserWriter.  Should I install the AFM files on both machines or just
>the printing one?

	There really is no way to install the afm files in the system
or such.  No reason to have them taking up room.  Throw them away.
(Keep a copy on back-up floppy, of course.)

	phil sohn	phil@ems.media.mit.edu