Vfblib

What's new?

- Fix a bug when exporting axis mappings to designspace.

Install or update [vfbLib via pip](https://pypi.org/project/vfbLib/).

Designspace export

I’m happy that there is now basic support for exporting a designspace file. You probably need to manually edit the exported file to suit your needs, but basically you can now generate static or variable fonts from a VFB with `vfb3ufo` and [fontmake](https://github.com/googlefonts/fontmake):

plain
$ vfb3ufo TheSansC4sTT.vfb
VFB3UFO Converter
Copyright (c) 2022 by LucasFonts
Build 2023-04-18
Reading file TheSansC4sTT.vfb ...
Source file was successfully imported in 346 ms.
Processing font: TheSans Variable C4s, master 0
Processing font: TheSans Variable C4s, master 1
Writing designspace: TheSansC4sTT.designspace
$ fontmake -m TheSansC4sTT.designspace -o ttf --keep-overlaps --keep-direction -i --output-dir instances
$ fontmake -m TheSansC4sTT.designspace -o variable --keep-overlaps --keep-direction --output-dir variable_ttf


diffvfb

`diffvfb` generates a diff from two VFB files. In normal mode, a unified diff is printed to the standard output. Via the option `--html out.html` a HTML diff is written to the specified file instead.

`diffvfb` is very slow.


usage: diffvfb [-h] [--html HTML] file1 file2

diffvfb Copyright (c) 2023 by LucasFonts Build 2023-03-15

positional arguments:
file1 First input file path (.vfb)
file2 Second input file path (.vfb)

options:
-h, --help show this help message and exit
--html HTML Output diff in HTML format to file path

What's new?

- Export a [designspace](https://fonttools.readthedocs.io/en/latest/designspaceLib/xml.html) file for multiple master VFB files
- Add `diffvfb` command to generate a diff between two VFB files
- JSON format changes for better diffability
- Add support for more multiple-master-related data fields

Install or update [vfbLib via pip](https://pypi.org/project/vfbLib/).

Designspace export

I’m happy that there is now basic support for exporting a designspace file. You probably need to manually edit the exported file to suit your needs, but basically you can now generate static or variable fonts from a VFB with `vfb3ufo` and [fontmake](https://github.com/googlefonts/fontmake):

plain
$ vfb3ufo TheSansC4sTT.vfb
VFB3UFO Converter
Copyright (c) 2022 by LucasFonts
Build 2023-03-15
Reading file TheSansC4sTT.vfb ...
Source file was successfully imported in 346 ms.
Processing font: TheSans Variable C4s, master 0
Processing font: TheSans Variable C4s, master 1
Writing designspace: TheSansC4sTT.designspace
$ fontmake -m TheSansC4sTT.designspace -o ttf --keep-overlaps --keep-direction -i --output-dir instances
$ fontmake -m TheSansC4sTT.designspace -o variable --keep-overlaps --keep-direction --output-dir variable_ttf


diffvfb

`diffvfb` generates a diff from two VFB files. In normal mode, a unified diff is printed to the standard output. Via the option `--html out.html` a HTML diff is written to the specified file instead.

`diffvfb` is very slow.


usage: diffvfb [-h] [--html HTML] file1 file2

diffvfb Copyright (c) 2023 by LucasFonts Build 2023-03-15

positional arguments:
file1 First input file path (.vfb)
file2 Second input file path (.vfb)

options:
-h, --help show this help message and exit
--html HTML Output diff in HTML format to file path

- Handle empty kerning classes
- Automatically make TrueType stem names unique

Install or update [vfbLib via pip](https://pypi.org/project/vfbLib/).

- Fix two bugs introduced in v0.4.0
- Export kerning exceptions with value 0

Install or update [vfbLib via pip](https://pypi.org/project/vfbLib/).

Improvements in UFO output

- Set default weight class to 400
- Clamp weight class values between 1 and 1000
- Don't write normalization timestamp
- Correctly parse vfb timestamps for openTypeHeadCreated field
- Improve output in "minimal" mode
- Add option to drop PostScript hinting
- Improve default values in font info
- Improve font name mappings from vfb to UFO
- Don't write zero kerning values
- Make TrueType hinting output more compatible with vfb2ufo output
- Fix error in TT stem direction assignment
- Fix writing of underline position (must be top of the underline)
- Keep track of moved point labels (TT done, PS to do)


VFB parsing improvements

- Parse more font info values
- Parse PCLT table export settings
- Parse "Create VDMX table" setting
- Parse "Slant Angle" value
- Parse export options
- Parse custom CMAP settings

Install [vfbLib via pip](https://pypi.org/project/vfbLib/).

- Output the VFB file name when running vfb3ufo
- Don't add empty TrueType hinting to lib
- Make sure point indices are only labeled if a hintset is attached to them
- Improve parsing of glyph bitmaps
- Save bitmap background to glyph lib
- Add option to base64-encode glyph lib data
- Improve Readme/Description
- Fix: Codepage numbers are unsigned
- Fix: Handle missing glyphs in kerning groups
- Fix: Initialize some more values in font info
- Fix: Support unnamed anchors
- Fix parser for key 1068 (whatever it is)
- Fix stripping null terminator from strings
- Work around guide properties index being out of range

Install [vfbLib via pip](https://pypi.org/project/vfbLib/).