Adobe Font Development Kit for OpenType (or: OTFDK)

Free in-house tools from Adobe (for Mac OSX, older Mac OS, and Windows, but not UNIX) for wrapping a PostScript type 1 font into an OpenType/CFF font. Direct download. Quoted from the site: The goal of the Adobe Font Development Kit for OpenType package is to share the tools used by Adobe font developers for wrapping up PostScript fonts as OpenType/CFF font files, and adding OpenType layout features. These tools are used for in-house development of new Adobe OpenType fonts. Use them at your own risk, and with no guarantee of support! We know that they work for the fonts Adobe makes, but have tested only part of what it is possible to express with OpenType. Note! Although the FDK directory tree contains a number of Python scripts, none of them can be used by double-clicking on them; they can only be successfully called as commands from a command-line window (the "Terminal" program on Mac, the "cmd" or "DOS" program on Windows). Note also that the AFDKO is for adding OpenType data to existing fully-designed PostScript fonts, and for proofing them. It does not offer tools for designing or editing glyphs. The proofing tools work with TrueType-based source fonts, but the makeotf, checkOutlines, and autohint tools work only with PostScript source fonts or OpenType fonts with Postscript outlines. Thomas Phinney compares it with the free TTX tool, and says this: Currently, if I want a simple and accurate representation of the contents of a TrueType or OpenType font, and possibly to edit the info, I have been using the wondrous open source TTX tool, which is based on the FontTools library. This dumps the font info to an XML text file, which can be viewed/edited in any text editor or anything that can handle XML. It can also recompile the text file back into a font. (In fairness, Adobe's FDK for OpenType also has table dumping/recompiling tools, just not quite as slick as TTX. Even Adobe folks often use TTX.) Mac download file. [Google] [More]  ⦿

CrossFont 4.1

Commercial 45 USD shareware Windows utility by Acute Systems: CrossFont is a Windows 95/98/NT utility for moving PostScript Type1 and TrueType fonts between Macintosh and PC platforms. Some features: Convert PostScript Type 1 fonts to OpenType fonts for Windows PC and Macintosh - Convert PostScript Type 1 fonts between PC and Mac. - Convert TrueType between PC and Mac. - Character outlines, metrics and hinting are not touched. - Drag and drop interface. - Registered version can batch convert to many file types at once. - Automatic sensing of file type. [Google] [More]  ⦿

FontForge
[George Williams]

George Williams' free Open Source UNIX-based font editor for type 1 and truetype fonts, previously called Pfaedit. Also does truetype collections (TTC) and opentype fonts. Note that FontForge can be used to do all conversions between all formats (type 1, truetype, OpenType; PC, UNIX and Mac): it's a formidable tool. The internal text format for fonts is called SFD. It is a format that is acceptable for communicating and storing fonts. Note also that there is a powerful scripting language that can automate conversions and various tedious tasks. FontForge keeps on getting updates by various contributors well into 2022.

Interview. Wikipedia page on FontForge.

FontForge documentation. FontForge history.

Footnote: the headline of this page is set in New G8 by Artifex and Michael Sharpe based on URW Garamond No.8, a project developed, like hundreds of others in the open source community, by FontForge.

Github link. [Google] [More]  ⦿

FontLab

A major font editor originally marketed by Pyrus, which also published TypeTool, BitFonter, AsiaFont Studio, TransType, FONmaker, ScanFont, FontFlasher, SigMaker, and CompoCompiler. It acquired Fontographer. This popular commercial font editor can be used for designing and editing glyps, drawing type, kerning, spacing, and hinting. FontLab VI was released in December 2017. It covers multi-color and variable fonts on both Mac and Windows. [Google] [More]  ⦿

George Williams
[FontForge]

[More]  ⦿

PFAEdit

George Williams' free Open Source UNIX-based font editor for type 1 and truetype fonts. Also does truetype collections (TTC) and opentype fonts. Note that PFAedit can be used to do all conversions between all formats (type 1, truetype; PC, UNIX and Mac): it's a formidable tool. In 2004, Pfaedit was renamed FontForge. [Google] [More]  ⦿