Auto hinting issue when stem thicknesses are added

When I add stem thicknesses to each master I get an autohinting error message on export. I tried disabling the /fraction glyph but then it changes to another glyph. Any idea why this might be happening?

Not sure if this is related, but even when I remove the stem thicknesses, the font seems to be taking a very long time to export. Glyphs says it’s still exporting the fonts after 5+ minutes which I have never experienced before.

Can you send me that file?

Hi Georg — I’m unable to upload the file here as it says new users are not permitted to do this. Could I email it to you?

Please send it a link (dropbox os something like this) as a direct message here, or the file by email to support at this domain.

Okay thank you Georg, I have emailed the file.

There are several glyphs that have several thousands manually hints. I added a check that will report the error.
This script will fix this. Run this in the Macro window.

for g in Font.glyphs:
	for l in g.layers:
		if len(l.hints) > 50:
			l.hints = None

Thank you Georg, that worked. There is just one problem now — I get an autohinting error message for /atilde.ss06 — this goes away when I disable it. I tried remaking the gylph but it still doesn’t work. Any ideas?

There are many issues with the hinting in the font. Please read the PostScript Autohinting tutorial:

Is there a specific reason you put so many manual hints and stems in the font? I do not understand their purpose. Very few hints are hooked up to the outlines, there are hints in all masters, sometimes dozens of stem hints overlaying each other. Many stems, are zero in many masters.

  1. As far as I can see, none of the manual hints make any sense. If you plan to use autohinting, simply delete all of the PS hints. There is a mekkablue script called Hinting > Remove PS Hints. Use it to remove all hints in the complete font:

  2. Delete all the stems you have in Font Info > Masters > Stems and set up one vertical stem (with the widths of the vertical stems in n) and one horizontal stem (with the thickness of the t crossbar), make sure to set the numbers for each master:

After these steps, the font exported fine with autohinting on.

Thank you!! All working fine now. I had added values for all the variations in stem thickness :man_facepalming: