Open Type and Small Caps

[Loz]

I am using Sabon LT Std, an OpenType Font. It contains glyphs for small caps.

1) When I use the small caps button on the character palette, NWP does not use those glyphs, but creates its own "fake" small caps, which do not look as good.

2) If I apply small caps formatting using the typography panel from the font dialog, the correct glyphs are used, but the formatting does not survive a save and reload.

I have found this topic which describes what I guess is a related problem.

Is this just me? I want to be able to use my pretty small caps!

Lawrence

[Elbrecht]

Hi Lawrence -

what if you try the same in Apple's TextEdit - I would guess it is an OT issue with Apple's text engine.

HE

[Loz]

I can't try this with TextEdit, because TextEdit does not generate its own version of 'fake' small caps. In other words, the only way to get small caps in TextEdit is to use the typography panel. When I do that, the text appears as it should, using the correct glyphs in the font. There is no problem in TextEdit with losing the formatting on save/reload.

As I understand it, NWP ought to work by generating fake small caps when no small cap glyphs are available in the font (e.g. when you are using Times New Roman), but if dedicated glyphs are available, it should use them instead. It does not appear to be doing so. Similarly (in reverse), if the dedicated glyphs are used directly (by applying 'small caps' from the typography panel), NWP ought to, but does not, recognise them and mark them as having the small caps attribute applied in the character palette.

On top of all that, NWP does not appear to be able to keep the formatting across saves.

Lawrence

ps. For the font geeks out there: http://ilovetypography.com/2008/02/20/small-caps/

[Elbrecht]

Hi Lawrence -

there have been OT issues with Apple's text engine - that's why I guessed that way. I don't have OT fonts running myself, the SC OSF fonts of mine are still all PS old ones.

In my eyes the Nisus SC fake option is for compatibility only. I would never actively make use of it - so the character palette signals only Fake On for me. And should Not at all signal SC font used - keeping original and fake strictly different. And if you use a SC font Save and Open again that stays the test. I just tried with an SC OSF PS of old - with no problem. A different font is OK - but new OT fonts have SC options built in Regular faces and the text engine has to handle it differently - and OT fonts differ therein!

That's why I still guess the SC handling of [NISUS via] Apple text machine is buggy - just one more OT font making trouble?

HE

BTW: What OS X version are you running?

[Loz]

In my eyes the Nisus SC fake option is for compatibility only. I would never actively make use of it - so the character palette signals only Fake On for me. And should Not at all signal SC font used - keeping original and fake strictly different.

Thanks Elbrecht. But that's not how it works with a font like Hoefler Text (which comes with the system). With that font, the character palette small caps option is synchronised with the typography palette, and whichever one you use, the small caps glyphs included with the font are used (i.e. nothing is faked).

A bit more digging has revealed this post from Martin, which again suggests a bug, or at least some incompability in the way different fonts are handled.

BTW: What OS X version are you running?

Running OSX 10.7.4

[Elbrecht]

Hi Lawrence -

Hoefler Text comes from Apple using AAT font rendering technology, so no wonder. But Sabon OT comes from MS Office or so using OT font rendering technology - and there still is Graphite rendering technology around too. There's just another round of previous font war going on - and then there are lots of ways to implement these SC in Regular fonts. OT just got not highest priority for Apple?! But who knows, Mountain Lion is on the way…

HE

[martin]

The issue of losing saved font typography options (like small caps) after reopening a file has been fixed in the recently released Nisus Writer Pro 2.0.3.