What is .glyphs file format?

ss831 · April 25, 2014, 5:51am

We need to parse the file .glifs (or another who contains the names of characters) to automate creation iconic font. Someone has this experience?

Tosche · April 25, 2014, 7:54pm

Glyphs file is actually a text file (or can be opened and modified with a text editor), if that’s what you’re asking.

mekkablue · April 25, 2014, 11:11pm

There is actual documentation for it in the works. But for the time being, I simply recommend opening it in a text editor, I think it is pretty self-explanatory for the largest part.

bela_frank · April 29, 2014, 4:08pm

It’s self-explanatory, really, and this just made me curious why Glyphs use its own ‘readable’ font format instead of UFO?

jakob_runge · April 29, 2014, 6:02pm

One reason might be that a glyphsfile can contain multiple master, ufo can not.

GeorgSeifert · April 29, 2014, 7:01pm

And .ufo file are two to three times bigger. But jakob is right, the main reason is the missing Multiple Master support.

bela_frank · April 30, 2014, 10:37am

Oh, OK, I wasn’t aware of that - thanks!

db300 · December 29, 2021, 5:44am

So, anyone has tried to deserialize the .glyphs file?

GeorgSeifert · December 29, 2021, 8:20am

What do you mean by that?
Glyphs files are text files, formatted based on the plist format. There is a spec: GlyphsSDK/GlyphsFileFormatv3.md at Glyphs3 · schriftgestalt/GlyphsSDK · GitHub

And there is glyphsLib, an python library that reads and writes .glyphs files.

reflectivist · October 30, 2022, 6:35am

What do the node type codes, c, l, o, q mean? I didn’t see that in the file you posted above (from Dec, '21)

Update:
OK, from looking at some source code for that python parser, I think it’s

C = CURVE
Q = QCURVE
L = LINE
O = OFFCURVE

S (if added) = SMOOTH, otherwise the node is SHARP.

I found more information here: Glyph Interchange Format
describing the meaning of those point types.

frankrolf · December 20, 2023, 12:50pm

While I understand the risk of commenting on a very old thread, this seems to be the most appropriate conversation:

is there a .glyphs syntax highlighting package (for SublimeText, for example?)
alternatively, is there a way to add whitespace to a .glyphs file for creating some kind of semantic hierarchy (with collapsible elements – similar to XML, for example?)

Thanks!

SCarewe · December 20, 2023, 1:15pm

What do you aim to achieve with syntax highlighting? What do you need it for?

jkutilek · December 20, 2023, 1:34pm

I have a Glyphs syntax file and a settings file for Sublime Text in my old ST repo. It also has support for Go To (cmd-R) to jump to glyph names and unicode values.

It should still work, but it is around 5 years old, and I use VSCode nowadays …

GeorgSeifert · December 20, 2023, 2:01pm

Glyphs uses the old style property list. I (still) use textmate and it has pretty good support for it. Including code folding. And you can use Text > Indent Selection.

Mark · December 20, 2023, 2:59pm

There is also this VSCode Plugin, which does not too much other than highlighting keys and values. But that is already of some help.

Making all objects available in the Outline of VSCode would be a nice addition to it.

frankrolf · December 20, 2023, 3:32pm

Thanks all for the responses. TextMate with plist (old-style) works. Actually toggling the code fold is slow, but that might have to do with the size of my file.

For the “why”: code folding comes in handy in a file with nearly a million lines – I was working on finding the causes for tracebacks in glyphs2ufo conversion:

github.com/googlefonts/glyphsLib

Traceback with nested “UFO Filename” custom parameter

opened 10:43PM - 18 Dec 23 UTC

frankrolf

I have a .glyphs source, in which the UFO Filename custom parameter is nested, l…ike this: ``` name = "UFO Filename"; value = "master_0/Dummy-Roman_6ptRg.ufo"; ``` This setup causes a Traceback: ``` Traceback (most recent call last): File "bin/glyphs2ufo", line 8, in <module> sys.exit(_glyphs2ufo_entry_point()) File "lib/python3.10/site-packages/glyphsLib/cli.py", line 276, in _glyphs2ufo_entry_point return main(args) File "lib/python3.10/site-packages/glyphsLib/cli.py", line 234, in main return options.func(options) File "lib/python3.10/site-packages/glyphsLib/cli.py", line 253, in glyphs2ufo glyphsLib.build_masters( File "lib/python3.10/site-packages/glyphsLib/__init__.py", line 152, in build_masters source.font.save(ufo_path) File "lib/python3.10/site-packages/ufoLib2/objects/font.py", line 592, in save with UFOWriter(path, structure=structure, validate=validate) as writer: File "lib/python3.10/site-packages/fontTools/ufoLib/__init__.py", line 948, in __init__ raise UFOLibError( fontTools.ufoLib.errors.UFOLibError: Cannot write to 'master_0/Dummy-Roman_6ptRg.ufo': directory does not exist ``` I don’t know how you’d prefer to solve this, but I did this quick-and-dirty fix just before https://github.com/googlefonts/glyphsLib/blob/main/Lib/glyphsLib/__init__.py#L151: ``` py ufo_path = os.path.join(master_dir, source.filename) clean_ufo(ufo_path) # nested dir: ufo_subdirs = os.path.dirname(ufo_path) if not os.path.exists(ufo_subdirs): os.makedirs(ufo_subdirs) source.font.save(ufo_path) ``` Possibly brittle, but fixes the problem on my end.

github.com/googlefonts/glyphsLib

Traceback with AlignmentZones custom parameter

opened 10:17AM - 20 Dec 23 UTC

frankrolf

I have a .glyphs file where each master has an alignmentZones custom parameter, …like this: ``` alignmentZones = ( "{671, 12}", "{612, 18}", "{574, 12}", "{495, 16}", "{465, 14}", "{436, 14}", "{416, 18}", "{0, -18}", "{-211, -18}" ); ``` This results in the following traceback: ``` Traceback (most recent call last): File "glyphs2ufo", line 8, in <module> sys.exit(_glyphs2ufo_entry_point()) File "python3.10/site-packages/glyphsLib/cli.py", line 276, in _glyphs2ufo_entry_point return main(args) File "python3.10/site-packages/glyphsLib/cli.py", line 234, in main return options.func(options) File "python3.10/site-packages/glyphsLib/cli.py", line 253, in glyphs2ufo glyphsLib.build_masters( File "python3.10/site-packages/glyphsLib/__init__.py", line 155, in build_masters source.font.save(ufo_path) File "python3.10/site-packages/ufoLib2/objects/font.py", line 593, in save self.write(writer, saveAs=saveAs) File "python3.10/site-packages/ufoLib2/objects/font.py", line 520, in write writer.writeInfo(self.info) File "python3.10/site-packages/fontTools/ufoLib/__init__.py", line 1301, in writeInfo infoData = validateInfoVersion3Data(infoData) File "python3.10/site-packages/fontTools/ufoLib/__init__.py", line 1867, in validateInfoVersion3Data raise UFOLibError(f"Invalid value for attribute {attr} ({value!r}).") fontTools.ufoLib.errors.UFOLibError: Invalid value for attribute postscriptBlueValues ([-18, 0, 416, 434, 436, 450, 465, 479, 495, 511, 574, 586, 612, 630, 671, 683]). ``` The problem here is that that’s just too many zones. ufoLib’s `fontInfoPostscriptBluesValidator` rejects the list of values because more than 7 pairs are supplied, which is not allowed per the CFF spec: https://github.com/fonttools/fonttools/blob/main/Lib/fontTools/ufoLib/validators.py#L305-L306 This problem could be fixed by editing `to_ufo_blue_values ` in `blue_values.py`: ```py def to_ufo_blue_values(self, ufo, master): """Set postscript blue values from Glyphs alignment zones.""" alignment_zones = master.alignmentZones blue_values = [] other_blues = [] for zone_index, zone in enumerate(sorted(alignment_zones)): pos = zone.position size = zone.size val_list = blue_values if pos == 0 or size >= 0 else other_blues if zone_index <= 7: val_list.extend(sorted((pos, pos + size))) else: logger.warning(f'Surplus alignment zone {pos}, {pos + size} omitted') if blue_values: ufo.info.postscriptBlueValues = blue_values if other_blues: ufo.info.postscriptOtherBlues = other_blues ```

@jkutilek – that link does not seem to work for me. Is this a private repo?
Or is it GitHub - jenskutilek/TextMate-Bundles: Themes and syntaxes for the Sublime Text and TextMate editor with a focus on font development ?

Never got used to VSCode, but maybe I should give it another try.

Thanks again!

jkutilek · December 20, 2023, 3:36pm

Ah, sorry Frank, that repo is indeed private. Here are the files relevant for Glyphs, they go into ~/Library/Application Support/Sublime Text 3/Packages/User:

GlyphsST.zip (1.2 KB)