[XeTeX] Absence of ligatures

[Khaled Hosny]

On Thu, Jun 10, 2010 at 10:31:20AM +0100, José Carlos Santos wrote:
> On 09-06-2010 21:09, Khaled Hosny wrote:
> 
> >>>>>>>I have been working on a text whose main font is DTL Unico:
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>http://www.dutchtypelibrary.nl/Unico_rdrct.html
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>I have just noticed that the "fi" and "fl" ligatures are not
> >>>>>>>created. To be more precise: if I compile this document:
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>\documentclass{article}
> >>>>>>>\pagestyle{empty}
> >>>>>>>\usepackage{xltxtra}
> >>>>>>>\begin{document}
> >>>>>>>\Huge
> >>>>>>>\fontspec{DTLUnicoST}
> >>>>>>>fi fl
> >>>>>>>\end{document}
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>I don't get the ligatures that I should get. Am I doing something
> >>>>>>>wrong? Or could it be a flaw within the fonts that I am using?
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>>Either the font lacks proper OpenType layout code, or you need to
> >>>>>>explicitly select certain OpenType script/language, you can try setting
> >>>>>>Language=Latin, Language=Default, Script=Latin or any combination of
> >>>>>>them and if it works.
> >>>>>
> >>>>>Thanks for the reply. Can you please tell me how should I set, say,
> >>>>>Language=Latin?
> >>>>
> >>>>The same way you set Liagtures=Common.
> >>>
> >>>Thanks. I tried every combination that I could think of and worked.
> >>
> >>Oops! I meant to write "and it did not work" here.
> >
> >If you have otfinfo command line tool (included in texlive)
> 
> I use MiKTeX, not texlive, and MiKTeX doesn't have that command line
> tool. But that's not a problem; I have downloaded it.
> 
> >, you can try:
> >
> >otfinfo -s /path/to/font.otf
> >
> >Where '/path/to/font.otf' is the full path to your font file, It should
> >list font supported scripts and languages, then try:
> 
> I get
> 
> latn            Latin
> 
> >otfinfo --script=SCRIPT -f /path/to/font.otf
> 
> All I get is
> 
> kern    Kerning
> 
> It is short, isn't it? It seems that it does not support ligatures.

True, I'd consider this a font bug. Now either using the map file or
entering the ligature characters directly, though hacky, are the only
non-intrusive ways to get the ligatures.

Regards,
 Khaled

-- 
 Khaled Hosny
 Arabic localiser and member of Arabeyes.org team
 Free font developer