Optimizing Use of PCL Soft Fonts in Windows 3.0 (70773)
The information in this article applies to:
This article was previously published under Q70773 SUMMARY
This article discusses how you can optimize the use of PCL soft fonts in
Microsoft Windows 3.0. This article describes how you can minimize the
amount of disk space used by soft fonts and how you can improve the speed
of printing documents using soft fonts.
MORE INFORMATIONPrinter Fonts
To reduce the amount of disk space and printer memory taken up by soft
fonts, Microsoft recommends that only the following typographic soft
font range be installed:
6,7,8,9,10,11,12,14,18,24,30,48,60,72
To further save the amount of disk space and printer memory taken up by
soft fonts, the following suggestions are made:
- Load only point sizes that will normally be used in a given font
style. For example, for Helv install:
- 11 point for body text
- 9 point for headers and footers
- 14, 24, or 30 point bold for subheads and headlines
-or-
Choose one footnote size (recommended = 6 point)
Choose three body text sizes (recommended = 8, 10, 12 point)
Choose four headline sizes (recommended = 14, 24, 30, 72 point)
- Generate normal and italic for all point sizes.
- Generate bold points sizes equal or greater than 14 point. At lower
point sizes, the PCL driver can simulate bold text effectively. If
the central use of bold is for headlines, then the starting point
size may be changed to 24 point.
- Avoid loading bold italic fonts because they are seldom used. The
PCL driver can simulate bold italic.
- Character sets also should be limited. If special characters (that
is, the bullet, accent marks) are not used in documents, then use
the USASCII character set. If these special characters are needed,
then use Windows ANSI, ECMA-94, or Roman-8 character sets (in order
of preference).
- Use Windows ANSI, ECMA-94, Roman-8 for point sizes below 14 points
and USASCII for 14 point and above. USASCII contains half as many
special characters, and therefore takes up half the space of the
others.
Screen Fonts
When selecting to install screen fonts to match up with the PCL soft
font that have been installed, do not load screen fonts for Tms Rmn,
Helv, or Courier. Windows already provides these screen fonts.
Screen fonts that use system memory may slow the overall performance
of Windows. Microsoft recommends installing only the following
shortened typographic range of screen fonts in normal face only: 8, 9,
10, 12, 14, 18, and 24.
Screen fonts are sized and modified by the screen driver to provide
normal, bold, italic, and bold italic from one screen font. If bold or
italic are installed, the corresponding normal face must also be
installed. Otherwise, bold or italic will be displayed when normal was
intended.
The process of selection that an application and screen driver use may
not select the intended screen font installed for a particular printer
font. Screen fonts are selected by the contents of the header
information in the font files by the application and the screen
driver. The screen font that provides the "best match" according to
the header information of the file will be used by the application.
REFERENCES
"Microsoft Windows Device Development Kit: Printers and Fonts Kit,"
pages 12-1 - 12-4.
Modification Type: | Minor | Last Reviewed: | 7/7/2005 |
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Keywords: | KB70773 |
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