[smufl-discuss] Re: General text implementation and separate characters for 8va signs

[dspreadbury]

Knut wrote:

> Firstly, from reading the SMuFL documentation, it’s not really clear to
me if or how
> characters meant for metronome marks and other text related situations
can be easily
> accessed through the keyboard when mapped according to SMuFL. Could
someone please
> explain this?

If you are simply typing characters from a SMuFL-compliant font into e.g.
a regular text editor, then you will indeed need to use whatever method is
provided by your operating system to access characters at arbitrary
Unicode code points. I have written up some basic documentation that is
included in the Bravura distribution, and which you can read online here:

https://github.com/steinbergmedia/bravura/blob/master/redist/bravura-text.md

> I'm also wondering why such characters are centred on the baseline. This
makes is
> necessary to change their vertical position in any context related to
text (unless
> you don't want it to align with the text font).

Please refer to the 'Notes for implementers' section of the SMuFL
specification for a detailed discussion about the necessary differences in
glyph registration and font metrics for fonts intended for use in a
scoring application (e.g. Bravura) and those intended for use in a
text-based application, or for inputting text directly in a scoring
application (e.g. Bravura Text).

> Secondly (I’m probably a bit late to the party here), at present, there
are only
> precomposed glyphs in the Octaves range (U+E510–U+E51F), except for the
8 and
> parenthesis characters. Ideally though, I think separate glyphs for all
relevant
> letters (both superscript and regular) and numbers should be included in
this range,
> to allow for leading and tracking adjustments.

I would be interested to hear whether others in the community agree. For
what it's worth, my personal feeling is that it is relatively unlikely
that a user would want to fiddle with the tracking or kerning of these
individual component glyphs, unless the font designer has done a poor job
in designing the characters to start with!

> Additionally, I think italicised parenthesis is most appropriate for
both the Octaves
> range and the Dynamics range (U+E520–U+E54F). Parenthesis are missing
from the Dynamics
> range entirely btw. and should be included.

You are free, of course, to make your parentheses italicised: the glyphs
shown in the SMuFL specification are taken from Bravura, which is of
course a reference font, but it doesn't prescribe the actual design of any
given glyph. You are free to diverge from Bravura as you please!

Daniel

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[Knut Nergaard]

Thanks for your responses, Daniel!

dspreadbury wrote

I would be interested to hear whether others in the community agree. For
what it's worth, my personal feeling is that it is relatively unlikely
that a user would want to fiddle with the tracking or kerning of these
individual component glyphs, unless the font designer has done a poor job
in designing the characters to start with!

I see your point, but then let me ask you, what's the reason for including each letter in the Piano pedal indication as separate characters? I realise of course that adjustments in spacing probably is not the reason for their inclusion, but perhaps there is common ground here anyway.

Another reason entirely, is for the user to be able to construct octave indications not included in the range, such as 8b, 8a (or their two and three-octave equivalents). Adding regular and superscript period characters to this glyph range as well, would perhaps be appropriate for the same reason.

Knut