11.2 Type 1 PostScript fonts and BZRto

The Type 1 font format, invented by Adobe Systems, Inc., is the most common representation for PostScript fonts. Adobe first published its specification in the book Adobe Type 1 Font Format in 1990. It defines a limited set of operations; general PostScript programs cannot be represented as Type 1 fonts. It also defines hints--ways of improving characters' appearances at low resolution and/or small small sizes--which cannot be represented in PostScript proper.

BZRto generates a Type 1 font `foo.gsf' from the input file `foo10.bzr' (the `10' being the design size of the input) if you specify the `-pstype1' option, as in:

bzrto -pstype1 foo

The file `foo.gsf' consists only of plain text (it's not really "human-readable", since Type 1 format requires encryption of the character outlines).

Although Type 1 format also allows for encryption of the entire font, this is not required, and BZRto does not do it. Some deficient PostScript interpreters do not recognize unencrypted fonts; but Ghostscript, the GNU quasi-PostScript interpreter, has no trouble. We do not know of any utilities for encrypting an unencrypted Type 1 font, but presumably such a program would not be hard to write.