OpenType Fonts
OpenType fonts are single-file fonts and do not have separate screen and printer fonts to keep track of. But here’s where the real font fun begins. OpenType fonts are cross platform. This doesn’t mean that Adobe Garamond Pro comes in a Macintosh version and an identical Windows version. Instead, the same font file can be used on a Mac or on a PC with no special handling.
But, as the late night TV ads say: Wait, there’s more. Whereas PostScript fonts are limited to a paltry 256 characters (isn’t that enough?), OpenType fonts can contain more than 65,000 glyphs. A glyph is any distinct letterform, such as a number, a lowercase p, or an ampersand. This allows a font designer to include swashes, contextual ligatures, titling alternates—even ...
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