SVG in OpenType Utils

What Is This?

This is a collection of (well, two; only one of which is relevant anymore) tools for creating SVG in Opentype fonts. [1]

Simply put, SVG in Opentype is a way of defining glyphs for Opentype fonts by embedding SVG documents inside those fonts.

This feature is currently supported by Firefox only. OpenType glyph definitions are still kept though, so you can use the resulting fonts anywhere.

Trying It Out

To try this out in Firefox, you'll have to turn on the gfx.font_rendering.opentype_svg.enabled preference. (navigate to about:config, search for svg, and double click on the preference with that name)

Then point Firefox at http://flores.geek.nz/t/svgot

Making a Font

You can use the insertsvg/insertsvg.py script to create an SVG font of your own. I've already provided a font and SVG documents so you can try it for yourself.

In the insertsvg directory, try:

./insertsvg.py LiberationSerif-Regular.ttf out.ttf reftest?.svg

This will spit out a file named out.ttf with the glyph definitions from reftest1.svg.

You can then include this out.ttf in a web site like any other web font.

Check out the reftest?.svg files to get an idea of how these SVG glyph definitions work. For a more detailed explanation of things, check out the spec linked below.

Making a Rubbish Font

insertsvg/insertrubbish.py is a script for inserting arbitrary data into the 'SVG ' Opentype table. As the name suggests, I use it for inserting rubbish into the table to see if my implementation can safely ignore it.

More Information

For more information on the SVG in Opentype format itself, the (draft) specification is very readable and can be found at http://dev.w3.org/SVG/modules/fonts/SVG-OpenType.html

[1] A better name for this feature TBD