Re: Thai font resources

["Edward H. Trager" <ehtrager umich edu>]

Hi, everyone,

Oops ... I guess I replied too quickly without doing enough research.
OpenTLE's FTP site appears to have directories for Loma as well as
other fonts (the ftp site is very slow for me connecting from the United States,
and maybe this is why I missed seeing this before):

ftp://ftp.opentle.org/pub/fonts/
ftp://ftp.opentle.org/pub/fonts/Font_Loma/
ftp://ftp.opentle.org/pub/fonts/Font_Kinnari/
ftp://ftp.opentle.org/pub/fonts/Font_Norasi/
ftp://ftp.opentle.org/pub/fonts/Font_Pimdeed/
ftp://ftp.opentle.org/pub/fonts/Font_Garuda/
ftp://ftp.opentle.org/pub/font/License_Gpl/
ftp://ftp.opentle.org/pub/font/Font_JS/

> Also, it would be nice if there was a single, standard, stable URL where
> people worldwide could download the NECTEC fonts.  I could not find them
> anywhere on the NECTEC site.  Finally I found most of the Garuda/Norasi/Loma
> fonts on OpenTLE.org (at the URL mentioned in my previous posting to this
> list), but I don't know if that is really a permanent URL. ( I know at least
> one very large Linux distributor obtains the Thai fonts by pulling them out
> of the RPM of one of the Thai Linux distributions).
> 
> On Saturday 2004.07.24 22:54:10 +0700, Theppitak Karoonboonyanan wrote:
> > On Sat, Jul 24, 2004 at 01:48:29PM +0200, Ruben Vermeersch wrote:
> > > On Sat, 24 Jul 2004 13:48:52 +0200, Pablo Saratxaga
> > > <pablo mandrakesoft com> wrote:
> > > > Kaixo!
> > > >
> > > > On Sat, Jul 24, 2004 at 01:12:53PM +0200, Ruben Vermeersch wrote:
> > > > >
> > > > > display of thai fonts on my gnome desktop. For some reason, thai fonts
> > > > > are rendered a lot smaller then regular characters. Since the regular
> > > >
> > > > > http://files.lambda1.be/screenshots/thai.png
> > > >
> > > > Could it be you are using the "Norasi" thai fonts?
> > > >
> > > > If yes; the problem is in the fonts themselves.
> > > >
> > > > If someone know of better freely distributable fonts for Thai
> > > > I'll be happy to hear about it.
> > > >
> > > > Or maybe is there a possibility to cheat with fontconfig (eg tell
> > > > fontconfig that when user requests size "x", then size "x+4" has to
> > > > be used instead).
> > > >
> > > 
> > > Most of my thai fonts come from http://linux.thai.net
> > > 
> > > But i have no idea which font my X uses
> > 
> > The font in the screenshot appears to be TLWG PseudoMono.
> > 
> > I would like to say, the relatively small size is currently inevitable,
> > unless the same font is chosen to render both Thai and English
> > characters.
> > 
> > The reason is that Thai font designs have to reserve upper and lower
> > space for placing combining characters [1]. So, with the same point size,
> > Thai base characters are always smaller than those of typical Latin fonts.
> > This is true for other multi-level scripts, such as Laos, Khmer, Tibetan
> > as well. However, those fonts always provide English glyphs with proper
> > relative size. So, if the same font is chosen, the relative size would fit
> > well.
> > 
> > On the other hand, some fonts, such as FreeSerif, try to cope with this
> > problem by scaling up Thai glyphs instead, letting the upper/lower marks
> > be placed beyond the ascender/descender. While this works in some
> > cases, the marks just get clipped in some others. Breaking the rule is
> > always not safe.
> > 
> > So, the ideal is to extend the "point size" definition to cover other
> > scripts than Latin as well.
> > 
> > Regarding the fontconfig cheat, this is what I have tried to do, without
> > success. As a rule of thumb, an English font of n points is suitable with
> > Thai font with n*1.3 points.
> > 
> > Reference:
> > [1] Thai font standardization working group. Recommendations for Thai
> >     font construction. (in Thai) pp. 80.
> >     http://www.swpark.or.th/opensource/download/Thaifont%20for%20Linux3.pdf
> > 
> > Regards,
> > -Thep.
> > -- 
> > Theppitak Karoonboonyanan
> > http://linux.thai.net/~thep/
> > _______________________________________________
> > gtk-i18n-list mailing list
> > gtk-i18n-list gnome org
> > http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/gtk-i18n-list
> _______________________________________________
> gtk-i18n-list mailing list
> gtk-i18n-list gnome org
> http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/gtk-i18n-list