# Is ruby pango right for this? **URL:** \ **Category:** Ruby-Gnome 2\ **Created:** [January 16, 2007, 10:10pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/is-ruby-pango-right-for-this/82021 "2007-01-16T22:10:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![robbiemuffin](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/r/3d9bf3/32.png) [@robbiemuffin](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/robbiemuffin)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2007, 10:10pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/is-ruby-pango-right-for-this/82021/1 "2007-01-16T22:10:35Z")
Hi all, and pardon me for posting right away! (there is no ettiquette information at the listinfo page) I have a task, which _sounds_ simple enough but it is looking surprisingly involved. I need to display some information about font files: Mac & PC PostScript (type 1), Mac and PC TTF, and OpenType. > From all the PS/TTF files, I need the fontname (much preffered to be > as Mac displays it) and it’s weight/face details: I need to > concatenate the fontname/weights to things like “Neue Helvetica Black > Italic”, etc. But fonts seem to place/misplace names all throughout > the fontfile and a simple extraction of, for example the “postscript > full name” will usually show the wrong information. I also need the glyphnames for any glyphs that appear in the font. And I need the unicode, if available, so I can distinguish, for example, latin characters from turkish, or symbol fonts (or OTFs, etc). This last part is easy enough for me to look up from the unicode range, I think. It’s with opentype that things get funky. A single opentype font file can have different faces, and different ligature substitutions for small caps, subscripts, etc. (Its all defined in it’s layout tables) I’m not looking forward to processing all this, it’s amazingly complicated for such a simple thing. But I have to gather and process all this information, and best I can tell there’s no tools around that do this for me all in one package. So I’m looking at Pango to do it – to me it’s just an added boon that Ruby has a pango interface! But I’m wondering, does anyone know how easy, or even possible this is? Can I get these informations all from ruby-gnome2, for each of the font formats? Thanks for reading! Robbie * * * Take Surveys. Earn Cash. Influence the Future of IT Join [SourceForge.net](http://SourceForge.net)’s Techsay panel and you’ll get the chance to share your opinions on IT & business topics through brief surveys - and earn cash [http://www.techsay.com/default.php?page=join.php&p=sourceforge&CID=DEVDEV](http://www.techsay.com/default.php?page=join.php&p=sourceforge&CID=DEVDEV) ---
**Author:** ![robbiemuffin](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/r/3d9bf3/32.png) [@robbiemuffin](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/robbiemuffin)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2007, 5:47pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/is-ruby-pango-right-for-this/82021/2 "2007-01-18T17:47:49Z")
Hi, I think you will be able to get some of the data you want like font metrics or character set coverage but some others like the glyph names are likely to be too low level for Pango. Also, one problem I can think of is that Pango, through Fontconfig, is only aware of fonts in terms of “what they provide” (languages covered, weight etc). You may not be able to load fonts from their file name. If nobody answers you here, I would suggest you ask your question on the pango list. To me though, it seems clear that the way to go is the freetype library. It can do exactly what you want for the font formats you have mentioned. AFAIK however, there does not exist Ruby bindings for it. You will have to take care of this 😉 I am the author of a pure Ruby library to manipulate TrueType fonts. [http://rubyforge.org/projects/ttf-ruby/](http://rubyforge.org/projects/ttf-ruby/) It will do what you want for TrueType fonts. And you could possibly read other fonts by converting them to TrueType with some utilities. This library is still at an early stage though. Mathieu PS: I have tried the following and get a segfault at line 6: require “pango” fd = Pango::FontDescription.new fd.family = “DejaVu Sans” font = Pango::FontMap.new.load\_font(Pango::Context.new, fd) puts font.inspect I am not sure whether it is a bug or I misunderstood something in the API. Mathieu Robbie Muffin wrote: > Italic", etc. But fonts seem to place/misplace names all throughout > It’s with opentype that things get funky. A single opentype font file > easy, or even possible this is? Can I get these informations all from > > * * * > > ruby-gnome2-devel-en mailing list > removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid > [ruby-gnome2-devel-en List Signup and Options](https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/ruby-gnome2-devel-en) * * * Take Surveys. Earn Cash. Influence the Future of IT Join [SourceForge.net](http://SourceForge.net)’s Techsay panel and you’ll get the chance to share your opinions on IT & business topics through brief surveys - and earn cash [http://www.techsay.com/default.php?page=join.php&p=sourceforge&CID=DEVDEV](http://www.techsay.com/default.php?page=join.php&p=sourceforge&CID=DEVDEV) ---
**Author:** ![robbiemuffin](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/r/3d9bf3/32.png) [@robbiemuffin](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/robbiemuffin)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2007, 3:44pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/is-ruby-pango-right-for-this/82021/3 "2007-01-19T15:44:52Z")
Hi, In [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) “[ruby-gnome2-devel-en] is ruby pango right for this?” on Tue, 16 Jan 2007 16:09:54 -0500, “Robbie Muffin” [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) wrote: > > From all the PS/TTF files, I need the fontname (much preffered to be > > as Mac displays it) require ‘gtk2’ families = Gtk::Invisible.new.pango\_context.families p families.collect {|family| family.name} > ``` > and it's weight/face details: I need to > > ``` p families.collect {|family| family.faces {|face| face.name}} > as Mac displays it) and it’s weight/face details: I need to > concatenate the fontname/weights to things like “Neue Helvetica Black > Italic”, etc. p families.collect {|family| family.faces {|face| face.describe.to\_s}} ## Thanks, kou * * * Take Surveys. Earn Cash. Influence the Future of IT Join [SourceForge.net](http://SourceForge.net)’s Techsay panel and you’ll get the chance to share your opinions on IT & business topics through brief surveys - and earn cash [http://www.techsay.com/default.php?page=join.php&p=sourceforge&CID=DEVDEV](http://www.techsay.com/default.php?page=join.php&p=sourceforge&CID=DEVDEV) ---
**Author:** ![robbiemuffin](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/r/3d9bf3/32.png) [@robbiemuffin](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/robbiemuffin)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2007, 4:30pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/is-ruby-pango-right-for-this/82021/4 "2007-01-19T16:30:11Z")
Hi, In [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) “Re: [ruby-gnome2-devel-en] is ruby pango right for this?” on Thu, 18 Jan 2007 16:25:44 +0100, Mathieu B. [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) wrote: > I am not sure whether it is a bug or I misunderstood something in the API. You shouldn’t instantiate Pango::FontMap directory. We can only use modularized Pango::FontMap. (like Pango::FcFontMap, Pango::CairoFcFontMap and so on.) They will be loaded dynamically. ## Thanks, kou * * * Take Surveys. Earn Cash. Influence the Future of IT Join [SourceForge.net](http://SourceForge.net)’s Techsay panel and you’ll get the chance to share your opinions on IT & business topics through brief surveys - and earn cash [http://www.techsay.com/default.php?page=join.php&p=sourceforge&CID=DEVDEV](http://www.techsay.com/default.php?page=join.php&p=sourceforge&CID=DEVDEV)