Monthly Archives: February 2024

Do you want to use the Serif Italic instead of the default Italic?

Now is possible to customize PragmataPro, and other fonts, using OpenType features via OpenType Feature Freezer

A very useful tool, available also as command-line, designed by Adam Twardoch and others that freeze OpenType features to fonts, by remapping their Unicode assignments.

The complete command-line syntax:

usage: pyftfeatfreeze [-h] [-f FEATURES] [-s SCRIPT] [-l LANG] [-z] [-S]
                      [-U USESUFFIX] [-R REPLACENAMES] [-i] [-r] [-n] [-v]
                      [-V]
                      inpath [outpath]

With pyftfeatfreeze you can "freeze" some OpenType features into a font. These
features are then "on by default", even in apps that don't support OpenType
features. Internally, the tool remaps the "cmap" table of the font by applying
the specified GSUB features. Only single and alternate substitutions are
supported.

positional arguments:
  inpath                input .otf or .ttf font file
  outpath               output .otf or .ttf font file (optional)

optional arguments:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit

options to control feature freezing:
  -f FEATURES, --features FEATURES
                        comma-separated list of OpenType feature tags, e.g.
                        'smcp,c2sc,onum'
  -s SCRIPT, --script SCRIPT
                        OpenType script tag, e.g. 'cyrl' (default: 'latn')
  -l LANG, --lang LANG  OpenType language tag, e.g. 'SRB ' (optional)
  -z, --zapnames        zap glyphnames from the font ('post' table version 3,
                        .ttf only)

options to control font renaming:
  -S, --suffix          add a suffix to the font family name (by default, the
                        suffix will be constructed from the OpenType feature
                        tags)
  -U USESUFFIX, --usesuffix USESUFFIX
                        use a custom suffix when --suffix is provided
  -R REPLACENAMES, --replacenames REPLACENAMES
                        search for strings in the font naming tables and
                        replace them, format is
                        'search1/replace1,search2/replace2,...'
  -i, --info            update font version string

reporting options:
  -r, --report          report languages, scripts and features in font
  -n, --names           output names of remapped glyphs during processing
  -v, --verbose         print additional information during processing
  -V, --version         show program's version number and exit
  

Some snippets:

PragmataPro Mono Liga Script (Italics → Script)

pyftfeatfreeze -R 'PragmataPro Mono Liga/PragmataPro Mono Liga Script' PragmataPro_Mono_R_liga_0830.ttf PragmataPro_Mono_R_liga_0830_Script.ttf &&
pyftfeatfreeze -f 'ss06' -R 'PragmataPro Mono Liga/PragmataPro Mono Liga Script' PragmataPro_Mono_I_liga_0830.ttf PragmataPro_Mono_I_liga_0830_Script.ttf &&
pyftfeatfreeze -R 'PragmataPro Mono Liga/PragmataPro Mono Liga Script' PragmataPro_Mono_B_liga_0830.ttf PragmataPro_Mono_B_liga_0830_Script.ttf &&
pyftfeatfreeze -f 'ss07' -R 'PragmataPro Mono Liga/PragmataPro Mono Liga Script' PragmataPro_Mono_Z_liga_0830.ttf PragmataPro_Mono_Z_liga_0830_Script.ttf

PragmataPro Mono Liga Serif (Italics & Bolds → Serif)

pyftfeatfreeze -R 'PragmataPro Mono Liga/PragmataPro Mono Liga Serif' PragmataPro_Mono_R_liga_0830.ttf PragmataPro_Mono_R_liga_0830_Serif.ttf &&
pyftfeatfreeze -f 'ss09' -R 'PragmataPro Mono Liga/PragmataPro Mono Liga Serif' PragmataPro_Mono_I_liga_0830.ttf PragmataPro_Mono_I_liga_0830_Serif.ttf &&
pyftfeatfreeze -f 'ss08' -R 'PragmataPro Mono Liga/PragmataPro Mono Liga Serif' PragmataPro_Mono_B_liga_0830.ttf PragmataPro_Mono_B_liga_0830_Serif.ttf &&
pyftfeatfreeze -f 'ss10' -R 'PragmataPro Mono Liga/PragmataPro Mono Liga Serif' PragmataPro_Mono_Z_liga_0830.ttf PragmataPro_Mono_Z_liga_0830_Serif.ttf

PragmataPro Mono Liga Fraktur (Italics → Fraktur)

pyftfeatfreeze -R 'PragmataPro Mono Liga/PragmataPro Mono Liga Fraktur' PragmataPro_Mono_R_liga_0830.ttf PragmataPro_Mono_R_liga_0830_Fraktur.ttf &&
pyftfeatfreeze -f 'ss03' -R 'PragmataPro Mono Liga/PragmataPro Mono Liga Fraktur' PragmataPro_Mono_I_liga_0830.ttf PragmataPro_Mono_I_liga_0830_Fraktur.ttf &&
pyftfeatfreeze -R 'PragmataPro Mono Liga/PragmataPro Mono Liga Fraktur' PragmataPro_Mono_B_liga_0830.ttf PragmataPro_Mono_B_liga_0830_Fraktur.ttf &&
pyftfeatfreeze -f 'ss04' -R 'PragmataPro Mono Liga/PragmataPro Mono Liga Fraktur' PragmataPro_Mono_Z_liga_0830.ttf PragmataPro_Mono_Z_liga_0830_Fraktur.ttf

A lighter MacOS script by Benas Svipas if somebody wants to use it instead of OpenType Feature Freezer GUI:

#!/usr/bin/env bash

# Install - python and pipx
brew install python pipx &> /dev/null
pipx ensurepath &> /dev/null

# Download - OpenType Feature Freezer (https://github.com/twardoch/fonttools-opentype-feature-freezer)
pipx install opentype-feature-freezer &> /dev/null

# Build - Italic stylistic alternates
pyftfeatfreeze -f 'ss09' PragmataProI_liga_0830.ttf PragmataProI_liga_0830_script.ttf
pyftfeatfreeze -f 'ss09' PragmataPro_Mono_I_liga_0830.ttf PragmataPro_Mono_I_liga_0830_script.ttf
echo "Italic stylistic alternates have been built"

# Build - Bold Italic stylistic alternates
pyftfeatfreeze -f 'ss10' PragmataProZ_liga_0830.ttf PragmataProZ_liga_0830_script.ttf
pyftfeatfreeze -f 'ss10' PragmataPro_Mono_Z_liga_0830.ttf PragmataPro_Mono_Z_liga_0830_script.ttf
echo "Bold Italic stylistic alternates have been built"

After it’s done you will find new .ttf files which will end with _script.ttf. Install them and you’re good to go. Remember to kill and relaunch your IDE or Terminal so it recognizes new font files.

The actual PragmataPro OpenType feature list:

To understand better how OT features works on PragmataPro I suggest to take a look at PragmataPro Handbook