Method and apparatus for font subsetting

• US 20080028304A1
• Filed: 07/25/2006
• Published: 01/31/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 07/25/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Imaging Holdings Corp (Monotype Imaging Holdings, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Monotype Imaging (Monotype Imaging Holdings, Inc.)
• Inventors: Chapman, Christopher J., Comeau, Richard G., Levantovsky, Vladimir
• Granted Patent: US 8,201,088 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/269
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/109 Font handling; Temporal or kinetic typography

Abstract

A method and apparatus are provided for embedding a font subset in an electronic document. The method in one form includes analyzing a document having characters of a font set where characters may have different forms depending on the location of the character in a word or one or more ligatures represent a combination of characters. A font subset is created corresponding to only the character forms present in the document and the font subset is associated with the document. Advantageously, the embedded font subset only contains the font characters which are used in the document and not all characters which may be present in a complete font set for all font sets referenced in the document.

Claims

1. A method for font subsetting, said method comprising:

analyzing a document comprising characters of a font set wherein the characters are associated with glyphs having different forms depending on a location of a character in a word or the font set where one or more ligatures represent a combination of characters;

creating a font subset containing shapes of the glyphs corresponding to only character forms present in the document determined in the analyzing the document; and

associating the font subset with the document.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein said associating the font subset comprises storing the font subset within the document.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein one or more of said characters have different positional glyph variants depending on the characters thereto and whether the character is an isolated, an initial, a medial or a final character of a word.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein a combination of characters in the font set is represented by a single ligature in the font subset.

5. A method for font subsetting, said method comprising:

analyzing a document comprising characters which have glyph forms corresponding to;

1) a location in which a character is located within a word or

2) a combination of characters;

creating a font character subset comprising only the glyph forms present in the document as determined from analyzing the document; and

embedding the font character subset in the document.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein one or more of said characters have different glyph forms depending on the characters adjacent thereto and whether the character is an isolated, an initial, a medial or a final character of a word.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein a combination of characters is represented by a single ligature in the font character subset.

8. A computer-readable medium containing program instruction for font subsetting, said program instructions comprising:

analyzing a document comprising characters of a font set wherein said characters comprise different forms depending a location of a character in a word or one or more ligatures which represent a combination of characters;

creating a font subset corresponding to only character forms present in the document determined in the analyzing of the document; and

associating the font subset with the document.

9. The computer-readable medium of claim 8, wherein said associating the subset of the font set with the document comprises embedding the font subset in the document or transmitting the font subset along with the document.

10. The computer-readable medium of claim 9, wherein the font subset is transmitted as a separate data stream in a media presentation.

11. A computer system for font subsetting, said system comprising:

memory for storing a document comprising characters having glyph forms corresponding to;

a) a location in which a character is present within a word or

b) a combination of characters;

a processor for;

i) analyzing the document to determine which glyphs are present therein;

ii) creating a subset of a font set corresponding to only character forms present in the document determined in the analyzing of the document; and

iii) associating the subset of the font set with the document.

12. The computer system of claim 11, wherein said processor for associating the subset of the font set comprises a processor for embedding the font subset in the document.