# Vertical metrics and line height issues with Mekkablue script

**URL:** <https://forum.glyphsapp.com/t/vertical-metrics-and-line-height-issues-with-mekkablue-script/34950>\
**Category:** Plug-ins\
**Created:** [August 28, 2025, 10:06am UTC](https://forum.glyphsapp.com/t/vertical-metrics-and-line-height-issues-with-mekkablue-script/34950 "2025-08-28T10:06:41Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Martino](https://forum.glyphsapp.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/49beb7/32.png) [@Martino](https://forum.glyphsapp.com/u/Martino)\
**Post date:** [August 28, 2025, 10:06am UTC](https://forum.glyphsapp.com/t/vertical-metrics-and-line-height-issues-with-mekkablue-script/34950/1 "2025-08-28T10:06:41Z")

</div>

Hi guys, I’m creating a custom font for a client, and something strange happened. I noticed that the line height is basically too narrow and the letters are overlapping.  
My metrics are:

- General metrics:  
Asc: 900/16  
Cap: 700/16  
Lowercase: 550/16  
X-Height: 500/21  
LineGap: 0/-15  
Desc: -300/-16

I set the vertical metrics with the Mekkablue script:

typoAsc: 710  
typoDesc: 10  
typoLineGap: 0  
hheaAsc: 710  
hheaDesc: 10  
hheaLineGap: 10  
winAsc: 970  
winDesc: 250

Before setting the vertical metrics, everything was working fine.  
Where am I going wrong?

Thanks for any clarification. Best regards

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![SCarewe](https://forum.glyphsapp.com/user_avatar/forum.glyphsapp.com/scarewe/32/18952_2.png) [@SCarewe](https://forum.glyphsapp.com/u/SCarewe)\
**Post date:** [August 28, 2025, 10:24am UTC](https://forum.glyphsapp.com/t/vertical-metrics-and-line-height-issues-with-mekkablue-script/34950/2 "2025-08-28T10:24:30Z")

</div>

You set the typo/hhea descender to 10, that is completely wrong.

Read this tutorial please: [Vertical metrics | Glyphs](https://glyphsapp.com/learn/vertical-metrics)

Basically, set the win metrics to cover the entire vertical space needed by your font (highest and lowest glyph).

Set the typo/hhea ascender and descender to adjust the line height, usually a good reference is using the actual descender of your font (-300) and the height of your Aacute (probably something like 950).

A good practice is also to keep the space below the baseline and above the cap height the same. SO, in your case, I would use -300 for the typo/hhea descender and 1000 (700 cap height + 300 from the value you used for your descender) for the typo/hhea ascender.

Also, set the lineGap value to 0.  
Keep typo/hhea values identical.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Martino](https://forum.glyphsapp.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/49beb7/32.png) [@Martino](https://forum.glyphsapp.com/u/Martino)\
**Post date:** [August 28, 2025, 11:18am UTC](https://forum.glyphsapp.com/t/vertical-metrics-and-line-height-issues-with-mekkablue-script/34950/3 "2025-08-28T11:18:12Z")

</div>

Thanks for the clarification.

I reset typoA and hheaA to 1000 and typoD an hheaD at -300 and it works perfectly, with lineGap 0.

Regards

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![alexs](https://forum.glyphsapp.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/2acd7d/32.png) [@alexs](https://forum.glyphsapp.com/u/alexs)\
**Post date:** [August 30, 2025, 1:22pm UTC](https://forum.glyphsapp.com/t/vertical-metrics-and-line-height-issues-with-mekkablue-script/34950/4 "2025-08-30T13:22:45Z")

</div>

In case someone finds this useful, I have this script [Set Vertical Metrics](https://github.com/slobzheninov/Glyphs-Scripts/tree/master/Font%20Info), which is a low-effort way to apply this Google Fonts [guide](https://github.com/googlefonts/gf-docs/blob/main/VerticalMetrics/README.md), which I find most reasonable (at least for Latin). Just set the line height and how you want to center it (such as for web buttons) and it calculates the rest.

 ![image](https://forum.glyphsapp.com/uploads/default/original/3X/c/1/c13b7ffc6c20ae38f380379e231e2c4a8aa3627f.jpeg)