[10070] in The GTK GIMP ToolKit mailing list archive
[gtk-list] Re: Music fonts
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Allan Black)
Fri Nov 13 05:44:51 1998
From: Allan Black <allan@florence.scotnet.co.uk>
To: gtk-list@redhat.com
Date: Fri, 13 Nov 98 10:44:01 GMT
In-Reply-To: <000401bdf94b$0c3475f0$1538040a@w9zzgwa.genam.com>; from "Stephen Molitor" at Oct 16, 98 4:22 pm
Resent-From: gtk-list@redhat.com
Reply-To: gtk-list@redhat.com
Sorry for the late reply: I've been having a little trouble with the list.
Seems SmartList is too smart to be fooled into accepting submissions from
a subdomain of a subscribed address ....
Stephen:
> > > Does anyone know of any music fonts that I can use with Gtk? Or
> > > suggestions
> > > on how I could go about creating one?
There are a few TrueType fonts around, but unfortunately, I haven't managed
to find a non-commercial (i.e. a freeware/[L]GLP one) yet.
> > > I'm planning on making a music editor using Gtk+, and I'm not quite sure
> > > how to go about it.
Well, I've started one and it's going reasonably well at the moment.
I just got a small piece of music to display in a drawing area (this week),
but it's still pretty rough and needs a few things like, e.g. horizontally
offsetting notes which are one diatonic position apart, or which overlap.
Middle C also looks a bit wierd, since I haven't done the code for ledger
lines yet :-) Etc. etc.
Sergei:
> > If, however, you do not need scaling, you might just take bitmaps from the
> > available Type 1 or TTF fonts.
Careful, unless you use a "free" font.
Stephen:
> I definitely need scaling. So, how would I go about setting up a font and
> "vectorizing" the notes? Can I look at what you've done with the Hershey
> fonts?
My plans are actually to work with static bitmaps initially.
Music notation is very complex (I actually didn't realise just HOW complex
until I started to think of it in terms of algorithms :-)
So, in order to make development as easy as possible, I decided to try to
separate the complexity of the music notation from the complexity of font
design/scaling/display. This means working in discreet phases:
1) On-screen display/edit using static bitmaps, using XCopyPlane to allow
choice of "pen" colour. Won't scale (or, at least, will scale VERY
crudely). I may convert these bitmaps to BDF later.
2) Printing (PostScript, of course :-) using a Type3 font.
3) Convert the Type3 font to a Type1 font.
4) Add the option of using the Type1 font for on-screen display.
5) Add the option of using third-party Type1 or TrueType fonts.
Editing is not started yet: I'm still working on the internal representation
of the score and geometry management. Editing won't be started until I think
I've got these right. :-)
If you're interested in getting a project off the ground, drop me a line.
Otherwise, you're welcome to a copy of the bitmaps I've designed. They're
in XBM format.
Allan
P.S. I'm using Gnome, but only for the menubar and toolbar. The score editor
widget (read-only though it may currently be) is pure GTK+
ARB
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