Glyps Mini: setting units/em, viewing unicode value, corrupted export

Hello,

My trial expired and after reading about the differences between Glyphs and Glyphs Mini, I decided to buy the latter.

Trying to export the font I created in the trial version does not fail, but when I try to convert it for web use in http://www.fontsquirrel.com/tools/webfont-generator I’m told the file is corrupted. Any idea why that may be? Is there a standard way of testing the .otf file for corruption that may shed light on what the problem is?

I can’t find where to set units per em. Looked through the menus and settings a number of times, and googled, but nothing. Is this feature really missing in Mini?

The trial had a grid view of all glyphs in the font, and I could see the unicode points for each glyph. How do I do that in Mini? I poked around the interface, and could not find a way to show unicode values, even for single glyphs (as opposed to all of them at once).

Thanks!

-a

You cannot set UPM in Glyphs Mini.

Unicode values are linked to the glyph names. You can check which value is related to which name in Window > Glyphinfo. What do you need the Unicode values for? If it is only for reference, then take a look at UnicodeChecker.

As for the corrupted file, you can check OTFs in DTL OTMaster. There is a free light version available. If you cannot find the problem. you can send the .glyphs file to support at this domain, and we will have a look.

And you can also see the Unicode value in the grey info box inside Edit view.

You cannot set UPM in Glyphs Mini.

It would be helpful if the page explaining the differences between the two versions was more detailed. The App store doesn’t let you try before you buy :frowning:

What is the default UPM value used? (I tried to find it before asking, but failed)

Unicode values are linked to the glyph names.

In the trial version, I could set the unicode value by typing “uniE123” in the name field, and then once it’s set, could rename the glyph into a more meaningful “iconClockThreeThirty” or something. Glyphs Mini shows the second title, but I can’t get at the unicode value.

And you can also see the Unicode value in the grey info box inside Edit view.

Same story, it shows the meaningful second name, not the unicode value. I think part of the problem is that specifying the unicode value for the glyph is done, for some reason, by side effect of assigning it a specially formed name (“uni” + hexCode), instead of having two text fields, one for the glyph name, and one for its unicode value.

You can check which value is related to which name in Window > Glyphinfo.

For whatever reason this list does not include my glyphs, which are in the private use area (E000 through F8FF).

What do you need the Unicode values for?

Any number of things. Like knowing which value to assign to the next glyph I add to the set. Or knowing what HTML entity number to type when I want to use a given glyph.

If it is only for reference, then take a look at UnicodeChecker.

Sounds so strange to me that I need to install the font on my system and then open a separate program just to view the unicode value. Isn’t that such a basic thing to allow the user to do? I’m new to all this, and am using Glyphs to build an icon font as opposed to a classic font, so maybe that’s why my expectations are different?

you can check OTFs in DTL OTMaster

Tried the free light version. It opened the file just fine, I did a consistency check, and everything seems to be okay, yet fontsquirrel import fails.

I tried to create a brand new font with just one glyph, and that works fine, fontsquirrel doesn’t complain. Could this be an incompatibility between Glyphs Mini and the .glyphs file created in the trial version?

Anyway, I can stop using meaningful glyph names in favour of uniEXXX, and recreate my font from scratch in Glyphs Mini, so none of this is a dealbreaker. Just kind of sad that even for my basic usage downgrading from trial to paid Glyphs Mini is causing so much pain.

Default UPM for OTFs is 1000.

Glyphinfo and Unicode Checker give you a precompiled list of possible Unicode values and their meanings. As I said, it’s just for reference, not to be customized.

Custom Unicode values are a pro feature. I’ll add that to the Glyphs Mini page. Anything else you feel should be noted there?

You can upgrade to the full version and get the Mini price as a discount.

FontSquirrel woes: Hard to diagnose from a distance, could be anything. You can send me the file if you want me to tell what’s wrong.

The grey info box does show the Unicode value if the glyph in question has one. The glyph name “iconClockThreeThirty” is not linked to a Unicode value, that’s why it doesn’t show, but standard glyph names are.

Default UPM for OTFs is 1000.

Thank you.

Custom Unicode values are a pro feature. I’ll add that to the Glyphs Mini page. Anything else you feel should be noted there?

How’s it a pro feature if it works in Glyphs Mini? Or do you mean to say “Custom Unicode values with custom meaningful glyph names”? Because just assigning “uniE123” works correctly as expected in Glyphs Mini, so saying that it’s a pro feature would misinform potential users.

You can upgrade to the full version and get the Mini price as a discount.

Thank you, I’ll keep this in mind. While you make fine software that in its full version has been a pleasure to use, I can’t afford 300 bucks for a rather niche piece of software. If Glyphs Mini didn’t exist, I’d look for other alternatives, or (sadly) revert to having icons as images.

You can send me the file if you want me to tell what’s wrong.

Thank you kindly, will take you up on this offer if my manual reconstruction of everything in Glyphs Mini still ends up with problems.

The grey info box does show the Unicode value if the glyph in question has one. The glyph name “iconClockThreeThirty” is not linked to a Unicode value, that’s why it doesn’t show, but standard glyph names are.

(removed part of the original reply; I misread mekkablue’s response)
The glyph in question does have a unicode value, because I set it, verified it, and am using the resulting font.

I also did verify that calling a glyph “uniE123” in Glyphs Mini correctly displays E123 in the top-right corner of grey box, and subsequently renaming the glyph to “iconFooBar” removes that value. This is not how things worked in the trial version of Glyphs. So it sounds like there’s incompatibility between the two versions, both in terms of features and in terms of the .glyphs file format.

I did some more debugging, and now understand exactly what’s happening. Putting all the details here in case somebody else gets into similar trouble.

Initial state:

you’re building an icon font, possibly because you read this article: http://blog.fogcreek.com/trello-uses-an-icon-font-and-so-can-you/

you have a .glyphs file generated by the free trial version of Glyphs

you have a bunch of glyphs in the private use area of the Unicode space, with meaningful names assigned to each glyph after you’ve set their unicode values

your font worked just fine, perhaps you used fontsquirrel to convert to the web-usable formats, but…

… your trial expired and you decided to buy Glyphs Mini

Broken state:

you open your .glyphs file in Glyphs Mini, export as .otf, try to upload to fontsquirrel, and get a message saying “The font ‘your-font.otf’ is corrupt and cannot be converted”

Reasons:

Due to (I imagine) incompatibility between Glyphs and Glyphs Mini, unicode values set by naming a glyph “uniE123” and then naming it “iconSomeMeaningfulName” do not carry through to Glyphs Mini. So you’re effectively exporting an empty font, and fontsquirrel unhelpfully tells you that it’s corrupt.

As a simple test, either rename one of your existing glyphs to “uniE000” or add a new glyph and name it that. Export .otf and upload to fontsquirrel again. The error message will not appear. Go through the steps, download your webfontkit archive, and open your-font-demo.html. Go to the “Glyphs & Languages” tab, and you’ll see your lonely new/renamed glyph there.

Solution:

So, your unicode assignments are gone. Recreate them by naming all your glyphs “uniXXXX”, and you’re back in business. And no, I suspect you won’t be able to have custom glyph names and unicode assignment at the same time in Glyphs Mini. According to the thread above, it almost sounds that it works in Glyphs by fluke rather than by design.

Thanks for your help with figuring this out, mekkablue.

-a

The ability to have custom glyph names and PUA unicodes was added after the last update of Glyphs Mini. It will be available if the update is approved for the App Store.

By the way, mekkablue, I just verified that I’m not crazy. Here’s the excerpt from my .glyphs file as last saved by the trial Glyphs:

{
glyphname = equipBowl;
lastChange = “2013-04-22 21:52:38 +0900”;
layers = ({
layerId = “599B6133-E197-4FB2-B530-8379B34B5655”;
name = Regular;
paths = ({
closed = 1;
nodes = (
“1133 692 OFFCURVE”,
… a bunch more nodes …
“1159 764 LINE”);
});
width = 1229;
});
unicode = E300;
},

So both a meaningful name and a unicode value are set correctly for this glyph.

If I then open the .glyphs file in Glyphs Mini, hit save, and then diff the resulting file against the original, you can see the unicode values getting wiped:

git diff icons.glyphs | grep “^-”

-lastChange = “2013-04-22 21:52:38 +0900”;
-unicode = E023;
-lastChange = “2013-04-22 21:52:38 +0900”;
-unicode = E026;
-lastChange = “2013-05-01 19:51:45 +0900”;
-unicode = E081;
… a bunch more lines like that …

I guess I can now just programmatically modify the .glyphs file and change all glyphname fields to “uni” + unicode.

-a

Oh, hi Georg. Thanks, this is useful to know. Do you have an idea when the approval might happen? A couple days, or a couple weeks out? If it were a couple days, I’d probably wait and not have to deal with losing and then restoring the meaningful glyph names.

-a

By custom Unicode values, I did not mean Unicodes in the PUA. I meant Unicodes not linked to the glyph names.

By custom Unicode values, I did not mean Unicodes in the PUA. I meant Unicodes not linked to the glyph names.

Got it. Sorry for misunderstanding. Sounds like the feature will be available in the next update of Mini, so all’s good. Please let me know if you know when this update can be expected.

Thanks!

-a