Re: fontsets

["Juan Manuel Macías" <maciaschain@posteo.net>]

Hi, Timothy,

Timothy writes:

> Yep, so in my config’s implementation I have an alist of fontset names and
> individual fonts. For something part of org-mode itself, we’d probably want to
> add a format level to this, something like:
>
> ┌────
> │ ((fontset-name .
> │   ((serif .
> │     ((pdflatex . "\\usepackage{myserif}")
> │      (lualatex . "etc.")
> │      (html . "and so on")))
> │    (sans ...) ... ))
> │ (another-fontset ...) ...)
> └────
>
> Actually, now that I think of it maybe it would be better to seperate out the
> fontsets and fots, e.g.
>
> ┌────
> │ ;; Fonts
> │ ((myfonta . ((pdflatex . "etc.") (lualatex ...) (html ...) ...))
> │  (myfontb ...)
> │  ...)
> │ ;; Fontsets
> │ ((myfontset .
> │   ((sans . myfonta)
> │    (serif . myfontb)
> │    (mono . myfontc)
> │    ...))
> │  ...)
> └────
>
>> In any case, I think it would also be nice if the user could add only
>> one family for roman, sans, mono or math, if he/she prefers it that way.
>> Something like:
>>
>> #+options: rmfont:Minion Pro
>
> Sure. There’s another bit of functionality in my config which I think is worth
> noting, you can add a -sans/-serif/-mono suffix to the fontset name to override
> the default body text font.

I see. I like your approach. And the idea of fontsets also seems very
productive. I suppose that a minimum configuration in fontspec
(Scale=MatchLowercase) should be ensured, in order to balance the
x-height when using fonts from different families in a single document[1].

The fact that all of this can also be "reusable" for other outputs such as
html, is a not insignificant plus! I definitely really like all of these
ideas and I don't think there is any contradiction with a balance
between those users who are content with minimal out-of-the-box font
configuration to be able to read non-latin characters, and those who
want more control over fontspec (font features, etc). And there are also
the users (me among them) who leave little or almost no space for Org to
write the preamble for us :-)

On the other hand, maybe (I think) it would be nice not to differentiate
between xelatex and lualatex, since at least at this level both engines
support the same fontspec settings.

[1] I have to add, by the way, that MatchLowercase is not always a
panacea. In many cases, and depending on the fonts, it may be better to
allow some contrast between families. Maybe it would be nice to add to
the documentation or to worg (at least for users who may be interested
in these topics) some basic recommendations for combining families (for
example, combining a bodoni with a bembo is usually a catastrophic
marriage :-).

Best regards,

Juan Manuel