[?] Crossplatform and Fonts
BlitzMax Forums/BlitzMax Programming/[?] Crossplatform and Fonts
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| 1) Do the 3 platforms share (or have installed by default) any similar looking fonts such as Tahoma, Arial, Courier etc .. 2) Which 'font file format' do the platforms share? I know windows handles *.TTF and *.FON 3) What formats can BlitzMax handle? 4) Do we load by filename or fontname? 5) Where should we place our own custom fonts? System folder or app/game folder? It might be worth listing the default fonts for each platform so we can narrow things down to a general list. Then, throw the information into BlitzWiki. Here's what I have in WinXP by default: NOTE1: .ttf format unless specified NOTE2: Most available in bold and italics as well arial arial black comic century gothic comic sans MS copperplate gothic courier courier new edwardian script itc engravers eras demi itc estrangelo edessa eurostile franklin gothic french script gautami georgia gill sans MT impact kartika kristen latha lucidia console lucidia sans maiandra GD mangal matisse microsoft sans serif mistral modern (.fon) MS sans serif (.fon) MS serif (.fon) myriad condensed nimbus web nimbus script nimbusSanTCon palatino linotype papyrus perpetua raavi rockwell extra bold roman (.fon) script (.fon) shruti small fonts (.fon) sylfaen symbol symbol (.fon) tahoma tempus sans itc times roman times roman special trebuchet MS tunga verdana vivaldi webdings wingdings wingdings 2 wingdings 3 |
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| There are I think a few that are similar on the Mac but also some unique ones. I don't remember seeing even half of those listed above. |
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| Arial, Verdana and Helvetica are all similar looking fonts and at least one of them should exist on each of the three platforms. I don't *think* that the Mac has Arial, but it has Helvetica for instance. |
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| Arial (PC) and Helvetica (Mac) should be avoided for cross platform compatibility due to the same reasons they shouldn't be used on a web page - one looks good and the other looks crap depending on whether you're using a PC or a Mac. As such, it is often recommended that Verdana be the font of choice for website design. I assume this would also be a good course of action in terms of cross platform games/applications. An alternative action is to take a look at one of the many free font websites, as these tend to offer the same font in both PC and Mac form, so it would simply be a case of making sure you have the right file for the right version of your game. |
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| You could always somehow include the font with your application? Install it at installation time? Or use it as a bitmap font? Or convert it to an openGL program? |
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| I would imagine that a bitmap font would be the best solution for cross-platform compatibility. |
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