Briem’s notes on type design: More metrics, if you’re really curious¶

You can probably skip this¶

Each character in AFM file has a line to itself. Here’s the information for the at-sign.

C 64 ; WX 931 ; N at ; B 43 -122 903 652 ;

The line has seven pieces of information. Here they are, one at a time.

C64; WX 931 ; N at ; B 43 -122 903 652 ;

The first number is the ascii number for the at-sign: 64.

C 64 ; WX931; N at ; B 43 -122 903 652 ;

The second number is the character width: 931.

C 64 ; WX 931 ; Nat; B 43 -122 903 652 ;

The third piece of information is the name: at identifies the character @, the “at-sign”. (You get used to shortened names. The inverted question mark is called questiondown.)

C 64 ; WX 931 ; N at ; B43-122 903 652 ;

The fourth is the leftmost point of the character shape, counting from the left side of the box: 43.

C 64 ; WX 931 ; N at ; B 43-122903 652 ;

The fifth is the lowest point of the character shape. This at-sign extends below the baseline: -122.

C 64 ; WX 931 ; N at ; B 43 -122903652 ;

The sixth is the rightmost point of the character, counting from the left side of the box: 903.

C 64 ; WX 931 ; N at ; B 43 -122 903652;

The seventh is the highest point of the character, measured from the baseline: 652.

What do you do with this information?¶

When in doubt, and you should be in doubt often, you can learn from the others work.

Should you keep accents inside your em-square for example? In most versions of Times, they are. In Palatino, they’re usually outside.