1fontopia(1)                    fontopia man page                   fontopia(1)
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NAME

6       fontopia - the console bitmap font editor
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SYNOPSIS

9       fontopia [OPTIONS] [file-name]
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DESCRIPTION

12       Fontopia is an easy-to-use, text-based, console font editor.  What this
13       means in simple English is that  you  can  edit  the  fonts  that  your
14       GNU/Linux kernel is using to display your text on text-based (vs graph‐
15       ical) terminals.
16
17       Unlike other console text editors which usually work on  one  PSF  ver‐
18       sion, or work on unicode tables only, or allow very minimal glyph edit‐
19       ing, fontopia provides all these functions together:
20       - It works on both PSF 1 & 2, you can even change file type and save it
21       to disk in the other version.
22       -  It  allows  exporting  and importing of unicode tables from external
23       files.
24       - It provides a user-friendly, easy-to-use glyph editor.
25       - It can easily change font metrics, e.g. length, width, height...
26       Console font files are commonly of PSF type (of  which  there  are  two
27       versions),  or of CP type (legacy fonts). Fontopia works with PSF files
28       of both versions, as well as CP, PCF, BDF files and raw font files.
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30       What's new:
31       ===========
32       - We added support for the PCF (Portable Compiled Format)  fonts.  Work
33       is ongoing on Windows FON and FNT files.
34       -  We  added the Extended Glyph Operations window (accessed by pressing
35       O) and the Glyph Info window (accessed by pressing G).
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37       Package dependencies:
38       =====================
39       Fontopia needs GnuDOS package in order to run. Furthermore, if you  are
40       going  to compile Fontopia from the source, you will need the following
41       header files: dialogs.h, kbd.h and screen.h. Those files  are  part  of
42       the  GnuDOS package. If you don't have GnuDOS installed on your system,
43       you can download the sources from https://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gnudos/, com‐
44       pile and install them, then retry running or compiling Fontopia.
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46       Alternatively,  if  you are using an RPM-based distro, you can download
47       and install the RPM from places like: https://pkgs.org/download/gnudos.
48       Additionally,  Fedora, CentOS and RHEL users can use yum/dnf to install
49       GnuDOS from the official repos. (Note: if  you  are  installing  GnuDOS
50       from an RPM repo, and you want to compile Fontopia from the source, you
51       will need to install the 'gnudos-devel'  package  in  addition  to  the
52       'gnudos'  package.  The former package includes the above header files,
53       which are needed to compile Fontopia from the source).
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55       Supported formats:
56       ==================
57       - PSF 1 and 2
58       - Linux Code pages (CP)
59       - Raw fonts
60       - BDF fonts (beta)
61       - PCF fonts
62       - Windows FON & FNT files support under development
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64       WARNING:
65       ========
66       (1) There is a major downside currently:  fontopia  doesn't  work  with
67       unicode sequences properly (at least not in all cases). If you export a
68       unicode table, edit it, and then import it to a font file,  you  should
69       be safe.
70       (2) Note that if you changed the font version from CP to any other ver‐
71       sion, only the ACTIVE font will be changed, as the other  font  formats
72       (PSF, Raw, BDF) don't support multiple fonts inside the same font file.
73       In this case, you will need to  open  the  original  CP  file  multiple
74       times, every time select a different font size (by using '1'-'4' number
75       keys) and convert to the new font version, then reopen the original  CP
76       file, select another font size, convert it, and so on.
77
78       Navigation:
79       ===========
80       Using the editor is very easy:
81       (1)  Navigate the glyphs on the right side window using the arrow keys.
82        Edit a single glyph using ENTER (or TAB).
83       (2)  Navigate the bits that form a single bit (on the left side window)
84        using arrow keys. Press ENTER or SPACE to set/unset the desired bit.
85        Go back to right window (glyph list) using TAB.
86       (3)  To zoom in (make the glyph on the left look bigger), press Z.
87       (4)  To zoom out, press X.
88       (5)  To open a new file, press CTRL+O.
89       (6)  To create a new font from scratch, press CTRL+N.
90       (7)  To save your work, press CTRL+S.
91       (8)  To save with a new filename, press CTRL+D (aka Save As..).
92       (9)  To quit the editor, press CTRL+Q.
93       (10) To show help, press CTRL+H.
94       (11) To copy a glyph, press CTRL+C.
95       (12) To cut a glyph, press CTRL+X.
96       (13) To paste a glyph, press CTRL+V.
97       (14) To show about dialog box, press A.
98       (15) To switch buffer mode (on/off), press CTRL+B.
99       (16) To clear a glyph (i.e. remove all bits), press C.
100       (17) To invert a glyph, press D.
101       (18) To export font unicode table (by default to a file with same orig‐
102       inal
103        file name plus .tab extension), press E.
104       (19) To show glyph info, press G.
105       (20) To flip a glyph horizontally, press H.
106       (21) To import unicode table from another file, press I.
107       (22) To show these keys without the extra jargon, press K.
108       (23) To show font metrics window, press M.
109       (24) To show the extended glyph operations window, press O.
110       (25) To change codepage of a CP font, press P.
111            If font is in BDF format, P shows properties (or metadata).
112       (26) To remove unicode table from font, press CTRL+R.
113       (27) To set a glyph (i.e. set all bits), press S.
114       (28) To show font unicode table, press U.
115       (29) To flip a glyph vertically, press V.
116       (30) To export font glyphs in textual format (by default to a file with
117            same original file name plus .glyph extension), press W.
118       (31) If editing a CP font and you want to change the active font (e.g.
119            edit the 8x8 font instead of the 16x8 font you are currently edit‐
120       ing)
121            press any key from '1' to '4' and the respective font will be the
122            active font to be edited. You can go back and forth by using the
123            number keys.
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125       The unicode values that are mapped to a specific glyph are shown on the
126       status bar (the bottom strip) to the right side.
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128       That should make you ready to move around and  edit  your  fonts.  Have
129       fun!.
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OPTIONS

135       -h, --help
136              Print command line help and exit
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139       -v, --version
140              Display program version and exit
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FILES

144       file-name The name of a font file to load into fontopia.
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TODO

148       - Testing and debugging - Help with handling unicode sequences
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SEE ALSO

152       info fontopia
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AUTHOR

156       Mohammed Isam <mohammed_isam1984@yahoo.com>
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1601.8                                MAY 2018                        fontopia(1)
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