[Q] TFM files headers

[barbara beeton]

On Fri, 13 Sep 2019, Taylor, P wrote:

> Tomas Rokicki wrote:
>
>       A google search immediately returns
>    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TeX_font_metric
> 
> which has the appropriate reference to tftopl as well as being a
> pretty easy read itself.
> 
> 
> Thank you Tom.  I followed the link and found therein a further link to a
> TUGboat article by David Fuchs entitlted What happens when you say "\font
> A=CMR10"  (note: no slash before "A").  Do you have any idea of which
> iteration of TeX David was writing, since TeX82 would require "\font
> \A=CMR10" whilst TeX78 would have required (as David himself notes)
> "\:A=CMR10".  BNB cc'd as she may know the answer.
> 
> Philip Taylor

(I actually read texhax, so a separate cc isn't necessary.
But anyhow, ...)

The article by David Fuchs is from TUGboat volume 2 (1981),
so TeX was in flux.  In fact, in the first paragraph, there
is this sentence:

   For instance, when you say \font A=CMR10 to TeX (\:A=CMR10
   in the old lingo), ...

so that should settle that question.

I poked around a bit more.  Seeing .../amsfonts/dummy in the
list from Didier, I took a look at that, and it identifies
itself as a null font, for the purpose of syntax checking.
I would expect, therefore, that it is highly nonstandard.

(Almost?) all the other fonts in Didier's list appear to be
Japanese, for use with ptex or similar.  There may be some
other requirements they must meet that I'm not familiar with,
but certainly ptex is rather different in some respects from
the more familiar "western" flavors; details unknown to me.

That's the best I can do.
 						-- bb