Font Glossary
Pixel: | |
Acronym for picture element. The smallest element in a raster image which can be turned on (printed) or off (not printed) to form an image (or bitmap) on a display screen or by any other form of digital output device. | |
Pitch: | |
Size designation of monospaced fonts – based on typewriter and line printer technology. Also refers to the measurement of the number of characters to an inch. | |
Pen Form: | |
An alphabet based on the lines made by a broad-nibbed pen, for example, ITC Zapf Chancery. | |
Parenthesis (): | |
As opposed to [] square brackets. | |
PostScript: | |
A page layout language from the firm Adobe allowing almost every imaginable manipulation of every element of all forms and figures. Used primarily for texts and graphics on laser printers and photocomposition. | |
PostScript Font: | |
A PostScript font is composed of a printer font for the output on a printer or image developer and – under Mac OS – at least one screen font for the on-screen display of different point sizes. | |
Prelims: | |
The opening pages of a document before the text proper. | |
Pro (OpenType Pro): | |
Pro fonts conform with the Adobe OpenType “Pro” character set; see “OpenType Font Character Sets”. | |
Proportional Spaces Fonts: | |
Fonts in which each character has its own width, as opposed to monospaced fonts. For example, the “i” in a proportionally spaced font is usually much narrower than the “M.” | |