Re: [ft-devel] a hidden gem: the autohint warper code

[Werner LEMBERG]

> however are there any plans to make it warp in the y direction?

No.  By its very nature, such warping can't happen in the `main'
hinting direction $(Q#|(B you would get uneven glyph heights if you do so.

> Also, does it operate in tandem with existing hinting techniques, or
> as an alternative?

It's an improvement for the light rasterizer only.

> Were/are there future plans to expand upon this concept?

Not that I'm aware of.  What do you have in mind?

> The kind of rendering I am after is one where the shape of glyphs is
> retained as much as possible; so currently I use the light hinting
> mode to *only hint in the y direction and then rely on subpixel
> rendering to improve things in the x direction. I find this the best
> compromise; hinting in both directions just distorts things too much
> for my liking.

Then warping is probably not what you want...

> In terms of whether to activate the option I would think it better
> to make it optional, for the reasons specified above - some people
> are likely using the light hinting mode specifically because it only
> affects things vertically, and this might scupper that approach.

Currently it's a compile-time option, cf. AF_CONFIG_OPTION_USE_WARPER.

> Of course, I am commenting without having really studied in detail the
> affects of enabling this option, though I can tell from your posted
> comparison that the warped text has significantly increased the
> overall length of the whole sentence.

This varies.

> *I have noticed however that inter-character spacing can still
> *affected under LIGHT hinting, is that a bug?

Good question.  I don't know yet, but I'm studying the code right now
and I probably can answer this soon.


    Werner