# TTF/Ruby, first release! **URL:** \ **Category:** Ruby\ **Created:** [November 9, 2006, 12:06pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ttf-ruby-first-release/75362 "2006-11-09T12:06:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Mathieu\_B](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@Mathieu\_B](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Mathieu_B)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2006, 12:06pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ttf-ruby-first-release/75362/1 "2006-11-09T12:06:15Z")
I am pleased to announce the first release (version 0.1) of TTF/Ruby, under the terms of the GNU GPL. TTF/Ruby is a pure Ruby library to read and write TrueType fonts. Tables supported are : - Cmap \* - Cvt \* - Fpgm \* - Gasp - Glyf - Head - Hhea - Hmtx - Kern \* - OS/2 - Post \* - Prep \* - Vhea - Vmtx (Tables marked with an \* are only partially supported) API documentation is written directly in the source code and may be generated with the following command-line: $ rdoc -main “Font::TTF::File” As you noticed, this release is marked 0.1 so do not expect API compatibility for the next releases. The tarball also ships some useful tools (and proofs of concept) based on TTF/Ruby. ttfdump: a command-line tool to extract informations about a font. ttfsubset: a tool which from a font and an input file generates a subset from this font containing only characters in the input file. Maybe useful to embed a lighter version of a font in a document or in an embedded system. ttfcairoglyphviewer: renders a selected glyph using Ruby/GTK, Rcairo and TTF/Ruby. It also displays markers for corner points, curve control points, and implicit points. ttfglyph2svg: prints to stdout a selected glyph in SVG format. Comments are of course welcome. And there is a large TODO list for the braves 😉 I would like to thank Evermore Software, China, where I am currently an intern, for giving me the permission to release this project (which started as a prototype for a Java program). Download: [http://www.mblondel.org/files/ttf-ruby/ttf-ruby-0.1.tar.gz](http://www.mblondel.org/files/ttf-ruby/ttf-ruby-0.1.tar.gz) ---
**Author:** ![Mathieu\_B](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@Mathieu\_B](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Mathieu_B)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2006, 3:27am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ttf-ruby-first-release/75362/2 "2006-11-12T03:27:08Z")
On 11/9/06, Mathieu B. [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) wrote: > I am pleased to announce the first release (version 0.1) of TTF/Ruby, > under the terms of the GNU GPL. > > TTF/Ruby is a pure Ruby library to read and write TrueType fonts. Hi, Mathieu. This looks great. I was wondering if it might be possible to convince your employers to relicense this under Ruby’s licence, though. The reason I suggest this is that it will ultimately be more compatible with a larger group of Ruby programs. I would like to be able to provide hooks to this library in PDF::Writer, but I don’t feel comfortable doing so under just the GNU GPL. -austin ---
**Author:** ![Mathieu\_B](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@Mathieu\_B](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Mathieu_B)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2006, 4:05am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ttf-ruby-first-release/75362/3 "2006-11-13T04:05:52Z")
Austin Z. wrote: > Hi, Mathieu. This looks great. I was wondering if it might be possible > to convince your employers to relicense this under Ruby’s licence, > though. The reason I suggest this is that it will ultimately be more > compatible with a larger group of Ruby programs. I would like to be > able to provide hooks to this library in PDF::Writer, but I don’t feel > comfortable doing so under just the GNU GPL. Hi, Austin. It was agreed that from now on I own the copyright of this project since the company will never use it itself. So the licence is not an issue. I will use double licencing like Ruby. How do you plan to use it in PDF::Writer? Mathieu ---
**Author:** ![Mathieu\_B](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@Mathieu\_B](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Mathieu_B)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2006, 4:11am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ttf-ruby-first-release/75362/4 "2006-11-13T04:11:52Z")
On 11/12/06, Mathieu B. [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) wrote: > use it in PDF::Writer? > I probably won’t be using it for about six months or so (non-open > source projects have to take precedence for right now), but one of the > things that’s problematic about PDF::Writer is that to use True Type > fonts, you must have a font metrics file (.afm) usually generated by > ttf2afm or something like that. So asking you to make it so that such > an .afm could be generated by TTFRuby would be a very good first step. > Ultimately, once I’m certain of exactly what data structure I need, I > may ask you to make it so that I can call TTFRuby (if installed) to > get the font metrics information for laying out the text using a > TrueType (and hopefully OpenType) font. It’s not quite where you are yet, but I’m as impressed for this because it was something I knew I’d have to tackle in the end. PDF::Writer is (and will remain) MIT-licensed, but I feel more comfortable with the Ruby dual-licensing on software that I will be using as a client ultimately. -austin