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User-defined fonts are supported with our HARDWARE terminals (I believe
the feature is known as DRCS -- Downline Reloadable Character Sets).
DECterm V1 to my knowledge does not support this feature. However, it
can use 8-bit fonts (see Ultrix man page for dxterm).
On Ultrix DS3100 systems, I have put a user-defined font in the
MIT font directory (/usr/lib/X11/fonts/MIT/fontname.snf) and there
is a utility 'mkfontdir' to build a table that the server and various
utilities require). After that I only need to restart the server (I
use shutdown -h now in Ultrix) to use the font.
DECterm still gives me an error message about not finding the 14 field
fontname it was looking for in either /usr/lib/X11/fonts/decwin/[screen75
or screen100]. However, DECterm does find the font in the MIT subdirectory
and sizes itself to the font (size, etc.) that fontname.snf requires.
So, any valid X11R3 font available in binary distribution format (bdf)
is convertable to the server native format (.snf) for font files on
Ultrix DS3100 formats. In release 3 information, Adobe has documented
the bdf format.
I am uncertain whether MIT/X Consortium adopted the .snf font file format
as part of X 11R3 (between VMS/DECwindows, UWS/VAX, and UWS/RISC, I've
been busy).
** real time update **
I spoke with someone at MIT. BDF is the standard format. Each vendor is
responsible for implementing their own .snf support in their server. In
addition, each vendor will provide a bdftosnf convertor.
In the case of DECwindows, and in particularly DECterm, we do not make the
font files available in bdf format. They are on the tapes as .snf only.
This is not a Digital problem, but one that is common to distributed
resources that each workstation needs to know about (colormaps, fonts, etc.).
Since fonts cannot be loaded into a server (the server must have a specific
place where it gets them, or at startup, loads all known fonts into a
cache in the server.). The X terminals, Sun 3/50s, etc., all will
have this problem for any application that uses a user defined font
(kanji, APL, etc) that is not available in bdf format.
So, the answer is, given bdf format and the time and the compilers to
translate bdftosnf to every server being tested, as per the X Consortium,
there will be complete interoperability.
However, if bdf format is not available, then there may be no way to
have Digital applications that specify .snf fonts to run on a remote
server of unknown origin that does not also support compatible .snf
fonts. [I haven't tested the case, but assuming you had all the .bdf
font files, and a X11 server that only used .bdf formatted fonts, it
should work. A bdf-only X11 server is supported as per the X
Consortium].
Larry Timmins
Financial Resource Center/SIC
NYA/USA
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...to clarify:
At the Xhibition (AUGUST 88, at MIT), I had Ultrix DECwindows applications
display on Apple Mac II (White Pine), 386, Amigas, etc. -- all without
problems. At this time, I do not recall whether I served xterms or
DECterms. However, all I tried worked fine. Including the Sun 3/60
that was running XUI.
At Unix Expo, we displayed on 386 (PC Xsight) Macs (White Pine again),
and a PC XT running PC DECwindows. No problems.
You may want to post your note in the DECterm notesfile to get better
coverage and to check on the availability of bdf fonts for DECterm, etc.
Larry T
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