Basic Fonts Tests - Part 2

A second quality check for fonts.

Included with Scribus is a wonderful and very powerful example of what the python scripter in Scribus can do. The font sampler script, written by Steve Callcott, is a tool to create a nicely laid out catalog of your existing font, which you can print and bind, as well as make a PDF for reference. It also happens to make it easy to spot broken fonts or fonts which are missing needed glyphs which might pose a problem when printing, especially high end or commercial printing.

Using this scripter module requires:

• tkinter - which provides the Graphical UI for Python Scripts
• Optionally, python-imaging, which is a set of python libraries for image handling and provides the nice preview above.
• Obviously, python support built in Scribus.

Running is easy enough:

Now, depending on the number of fonts, kinds of fonts and speed/memory of your machine, it might take a while for the script to run. Approximately, 700 plus fonts on a P4 might will take a few minutes, but also remember the script is not only scanning all your fonts, but also automagically adding pages and laying them out too. If memory is short or you have lots of fonts, in the order of 1000 plus, you might want to split the job in parts.

Results:

Note the output on the left and the right. The left side is a known high quality Type 1 font. The right side shows a freeware font from a bug report. Note, the lack of glyphs above, does not always indicate a broken font. Some specialty fonts like symbol fonts, dingbats and some non-Latin fonts may show the same results, but for a normal font, the results above are usually an indication of possible trouble.

Looking in the console

Font /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/URW/p052023l.pfb is broken, discarding it Font /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/URW/p052023l.pfb is broken, discarding it Font /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/URW/p052023l.pfb is broken, discarding it....