[R] Truetype and Opentype font in pdf device

[Prof Brian Ripley]

On Sat, 15 Jan 2011, Kohske Takahashi wrote:

> Deal all,
>
> I want to know if truetype or opentype fonts are available in pdf
> device (i.e., pdf() or dev.copy2pdf()), and if so, how to do it?

They are not in general available in PDF, the language.  The 
cairo-based device embed individual glyph information from such fonts 
(perhaps as vectors and perhaps as bitmaps).

> Now I can do as followings:
>
> 1. convert ttf to afm using ttf2afm, e.g.: $ ttf2afm Impact.ttf > Impact.afm
> 2. put the afm file in $R_HOME/library/grDevices/afm
> 3. register a new type1 font: pdfFonts(Impact=Type1Font("Impact",
> rep("Impact.afm", 4), encoding = "TeXtext.enc"))
> 4. specify the fontfamily in gpar: grid.text('hello grid world',
> gp=gpar(fontfamily="Impact"))
>
> but obviously, it is better if truetype or opentype fonts are directly
> available without conversion to type1 font.

But you would still need to make the font available to your PDF 
viewer/printer, and in general that does need coversion (to a font 
type supported in PDF or to bitmaps/vectors).

> Also, I found that Cairo package can handle truetype or opnetype font.
> However, the package seems not to support fontfamily, hence I cannot
> use it through gpar.

Have you not considered the built-in and fully featured cairo_pdf 
device?  (Not Windows, but you didn't tell us your OS.)

> Does anyone know about this topic?
>
> Thank you in advance.
>
> --
> Kohske Takahashi <takahashi.kohske at gmail.com>
>
> Research Center for Advanced Science and Technology,
> The University of  Tokyo, Japan.
> http://www.fennel.rcast.u-tokyo.ac.jp/profilee_ktakahashi.html
>
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>

-- 
Brian D. Ripley,                  ripley at stats.ox.ac.uk
Professor of Applied Statistics,  http://www.stats.ox.ac.uk/~ripley/
University of Oxford,             Tel:  +44 1865 272861 (self)
1 South Parks Road,                     +44 1865 272866 (PA)
Oxford OX1 3TG, UK                Fax:  +44 1865 272595