GFtoDVI: Character proofs of fonts

GFtoDVI makes proof sheets from a GF bitmap file as output by, for example, Metafont (see section Metafont: Creating typeface families). This is an indispensable aid for font designers or Metafont hackers. Synopsis:

gftodvi [option]... gfname[gf]

The font gfname is searched for in the usual places (see section `Glyph lookup' in Kpathsea). To see all the relevant paths, set the environment variable KPATHSEA_DEBUG to `-1' before running the program.

The suffix `gf' is supplied if not already present. This suffix is not an extension; no `.' precedes it: for instance `cmr10.600gf'.

The output filename is the basename of gfname extended with `.dvi', e.g., `gftodvi /wherever/foo.600gf' creates `./foo.dvi'.

The characters from gfname appear one per page in the DVI output, with labels, titles, and annotations, as specified in Appendix H (Hardcopy Proofs) of The Metafontbook.

GFtoDVI uses several fonts besides gfname itself:

• gray font (default `gray'): for the pixels that actually make up the character. Simply using black is not right, since then labels, key points, and other information could not be shown.
• title font (default `cmr8'): for the header information at the top of each output page.
• label font (default `cmtt10'): for the labels on key points of the figure.
• slant font (no default): for diagonal lines, which are otherwise simulated using horizontal and vertical rules.

To change the default fonts, you must use special commands in your Metafont source file.

The program accepts the following option, as well as the standard `-verbose', `-help', and `-version' (see section Common options):

`-overflow-label-offset=points'

Typeset the so-called overflow labels, if any, points TeX points from the right edge of the character bounding box. The default is a little over two inches (ten million scaled points, to be precise). Overflow equations are used to locate coordinates when their actual position is too crowded with other information.

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