Re: `.vf's, `.enc's, `.tfms', MMs, and problems with fontinst...

["Melissa O'Neill" <oneill@cs.sfu.ca>]

I wrote:
>> [R]emoving all documentation but a pointer to the LaTeX Graphics
>> Companion for the current release was a considerable mistake.

... to which Sebastian Rahtz replied:
> eh? no-one has done this or suggested doing it. please dont think that
> `finst' was put up as anything other than a convenience for fontinst
> gurus. when fontinst proper is updated to be the same as finst, of
> course it must have its documentation with it.

The README file with finst says:

  % Unofficial fontinst 1.6
  % -----------------------
  % 
  % This is an unofficial fontinst 1.6. It was created
  % by Sebastian Rahtz (s.rahtz@elsevier.co.uk) and not by Alan Jeffrey
  % (the real author of fontinst). Please contact Sebastian with
  % any questions or complaints
  % 
  % This release of fontinst is as described in the LaTeX Graphics
  % Companion, Goossens, Rahtz and Mittelbach, Addison Wesley 1997
  % 1997/09/16

... if what is in the LaTeX Graphics Companion is identical to the
documentation for the last official release of fontinst, then maybe the
README should also point to where that document can be found on CTAN.
Certainly I read the README as trying to twist my arm into buying a book
(which I can't afford right now), even if that wasn't anyone's intent.

I also wrote:
>> Possibly worse than fontinst lack of documentation, is that it crashes.

... to which Sebastian Rahtz replied:
> get yourself web2c 7.1 and experiment with bumping up the memory in
> the texmf.cnf file. 

I'll wait for the latest teTeX, which I believe should be sometime
soonish (?). 

Doing a trial run with OzTeX does seem to indicate that it works, although
there is still the problem with fractional widths in the AFM file;
fractional widths for Kern pairs do make fontinst crash, and I have my
suspicions that fractional widths for characters get truncated to
integers.

Anyway thanks for the pointers; this is certainly proving enlightening,

    Melissa.