TrueType Fonts in Debian mini-HOWTO: Printing (ghostscript)

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## 4. Printing (`ghostscript`)

Starting with version 4, `ghostscript` has supported TrueType fonts as a compile-time option. Two Debian packages provide `ghostscript`:

- `main/binary-*/text/gs_*.deb` is DFSG-compliant version 5.10,
- `non-free/binary-*/gs-aladdin_*.deb` is non-DFSG-compliant version 5.50.

Both versions support TrueType fonts.

## 4.1 Configuring `Ghostscript` to use TrueType fonts

If you have a working `xfstt` server, it is easy to configure `ghostscript` to use TrueType fonts. We simply execute the following command:

> `

>     # xfstt --gslist --sync >> /etc/gs.Fontmap

> `

In practice, I've found it beneficial to make several small changes to the font definitions generated by `xfstt`. First, if a font name does not contain any spaces, I change the name to the usual notation. If a font name does contain spaces, I replace all spaces with dashes and the original name is added as an alias to the new name.

Finally, I prepend `TTF-` (or `MS-`) to all font names to minimize problems caused by a TrueType font having an identical name to an preexisting font.

Thus

> `

>     (Arial)               (/usr/share/fonts/truetype/arial.ttf)   ;
>     (Arial Bold Italic)   (/usr/share/fonts/truetype/arialbi.ttf) ;

> `

becomes

> `

>     /MS-Arial             (/usr/share/fonts/truetype/arial.ttf)   ;
>     /MS-Arial-Bold-Italic (/usr/share/fonts/truetype/arialbi.ttf) ;
>     (Arial Bold Italic)   /MS-Arial-Bold-Italic                   ;
>     /Arial                /MS-Arial                               ;

> `

The aliases ensure that `ghostscript` and `xfstt` can still specify the same font by a common name.

Much more significantly, with the change in the font names it's possible to instruct `ghostscript` to use TrueType fonts instead of the standard fonts. The documentation claims that this is also possible with parenthetical notation, but I could not get it to work.

For instance, we can instruct `ghostscript` to replace Helvetica fonts with Microsoft's free Arial fonts by appending the following lines to the `/etc/gs.Fontmap` file:

> `

>     /Helvetica               /MS-Arial              ;
>     /Helvetica-Oblique       /MS-Arial-Italic       ;
>     /Helvetica-Bold          /MS-Arial-Bold         ;
>     /Helvetica-BoldOblique   /MS-Arial-Bold-Italic  ;

> `

Similar aliases can be defined for the other standard fonts. These aliases would be most useful on `samba` printers serving Windows clients.

## 4.2 Printing TrueType font specimens

The best way to verify that `ghostscript` is properly configured to use TrueType fonts is to print font specimen pages. Assuming that you're running `ghostscript` 5.50 and that it is your default print queue, you can print all TrueType fonts with the following command:

> `

>     # xfstt --gslist --sync | printfont

> `

where `printfont` is the following shell script

> `

>     #!/bin/sh

>     set -e
>     IFS= ')'

>     while read fontname rest
>     do
>         cat << EOM | lpr
>     %!PS
>     (/usr/lib/ghostscript/5.50/prfont.ps) run
>     $fontname) DoFont
>     EOM
>     done

> `

If you wish to print only a few fonts, the following script will be easier to use:

> `

>     #!/bin/sh

>     set -e
>     while read -p "Font name, or ^D to exit: " fontname
>     do
>         cat << EOM | lpr
>     %!PS
>     (/usr/lib/ghostscript/5.50/prfont.ps) run
>     $fontname DoFont
>     EOM
>     done

> `

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