Nimbus-16 Font: Does it exist?

[pixelma]

The font on that page looks different from the rockbox nimbus fonts - from what I can see in the preview.

Nimbus is not jut one font- It is a family of fonts. The Nimbus fonts (among other type faces) that URW donated are Nimbus Roman no. 9, Nimbus Sans and Nimbus Mono.

I'm aware that this is a font family but the "Nimbus Sans" (also the others) you linked to don't look similar to the rockbox ones, compare the uppercase "A"s for example. Guess what I really wanted to say is that it doesn't seem to be the font the rockbox nimbus derived from and they only share the name...

[cpchan]

I'm aware that this is a font family but the "Nimbus Sans" (also the others) you linked to don't look similar to the rockbox ones, compare the uppercase "A"s for example. Guess what I really wanted to say is that it doesn't seem to be the font the rockbox nimbus derived from and they only share the name...

I think there is a difference between the ones they (URW) sells and the fonts they donated. The Nimbus Sans that Rockbox uses is from the ghostscript standard font pack. I only linked to URW as a  courtesy because everyone is grateful that they donated a set of high quality fonts.

Charles

[cpchan]

However, I somehow missed out the point I was really trying to make:

Is this the exact same original that the project posesses, especially with respect to licensing, so that I could freely re-distribute my new .fnt files with, for instance, a WPS?

The fonts are licensed under GPL with an exception that you can put these fonts in your own non-GPLed documents. So yes, you can distribute them freely as long as you abide by the GPL. It is included in every Ghostscript installation under Linux and other platforms.

Charles

[bascule]

Excellent, thanks.

[cpchan]

Excellent, thanks.

No problem.

Charles

[Mikerman]

Lest it go unsaid, thanks for the efforts here.  Nimbus is a very readable font in its many variations, and it would be great to have it in a variety of sizes.  It is especially readable in the car across the dash, and there seems to be a lesser number of available fonts here in larger sizes that serve well in that role (larger fonts and thick enough to read easily).

All postings of nice results are appreciated, including for possible inclusion in the font pack.

[ckhirnigs113]

I agree, thanks to all those that have contributed to this cause.  The nimbus font is the most readable to me as well.  I will give the conversion another try.  Thanks, CK

[ckhirnigs113]

cpchan, I just downloaded the ghostscript files but I don't know what the individual files are.  I put this file: n021023l.pfm into Font Converter but it didn't work.  How do I convert these to .fnt files?  Thanks, CK

[cpchan]

I put this file: n021023l.pfm into Font Converter but it didn't work.  How do I convert these to .fnt files?  Thanks, CK

I converted it to a ttf for you- see if it works. Just rename the file to a zip file and unzip.

Charles


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[ckhirnigs113]

Thanks cpchan, but everytime I try and do the conversion I get the error as follows:

  Converting TTF/OTF to BDF...
'otf2bdf' is not recognized as an internal or external command,
operable program or batch file.

and:

  Converting BDF to ROCKbox FNT...
'convbdf' is not recognized as an internal or external command,
operable program or batch file.

What do you think the problem is?  Thanks for the help, CK

[Febs]

My guess is that you missed this part of the instructions:

This is a MS-DOS (Windows) batch file which makes use of some free programs to convert any TrueType or OpenType font automatically to the Rockbox FNT format. All you need is to start the command prompt,

makefont [fontname]

[bascule]

But you shouldn't need to get the programs separately, they are part of the Rockbox Font Converter package.

Are you sure you downloaded both zip files?

New users please download the full package first, then get the lite edition (Which is a newer version)

As the original author of that utility seems to have disappeared, I really ought to upload my latest version to the Wiki...

[ckhirnigs113]

Thanks, I had just updated the lite version instead of the full install.  It is now working.

[gorman]

Has a Nimbus-16 ever been produced? The current gap, from 14 to 19 it's really huge...