What non-English ligatures are there?

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Comments

  • Nick Shinn
    Nick Shinn Posts: 2,216
    I like the term you used a while ago John, Dynamic Ligatures/Ligaturing.

  • Igor Freiberger
    Igor Freiberger Posts: 280
    @Peter Constable
    John is referring to its approach of "dynamic ligatures" using <mark> and <mkmk> OpenType features. You don't need to create, for example, a g+í ligature if you have a g+dotlessi ligature (or alternate g and alternate dotlessi) and the combining acute accent. Just like the single letters with diacritics.

    @John Hudson
    I know, this is a reference repertoire I use to generate the OT features and test the dynamic positioning of diacritics. I still have adjusts to do. But thanks for the note!
  • John Hudson
    John Hudson Posts: 3,229
    @Peter Constable

    cf. Brill, and other fonts that use contextual variant shapes of letters that dynamically ligate, rather than ligature glyphs. See pages 23–25 of this PDF:
    http://tiro.com/John/Hudson-Brill-DECK.pdf
  • Peter Constable
    Peter Constable Posts: 210
    @Igor Freiberger
    Apparently John is not referring to dynamic composition of combining marks (which I thought might be what he meant). Rather, he means dynamic composition of ligature components to produce visual appearance of ligatures.

    @John Hudson
    > letters that dynamically ligate, rather than ligature glyphs

    That wording isn't the clearest: we commonly say "ligate" to mean a ligature substitution, which is specifically not what you mean. I think "dynamically compose" is a better way to describe it: that's familiar in relation to dynamic positioning of marks, and what you're referring to is very similar: it can involve single substitution of alternates and positioning adjustment; it just doesn't involve marks.
  • John Hudson
    John Hudson Posts: 3,229
    I agree that the terminology is imprecise. I sometimes talk about ‘graphically ligating’, to distinguish from a ligature as a technical implementation.

    it just doesn't involve marks.
    Well, it could. It depends how complex one wants the contextual substitutions to get. In Brill, for example, I have the post-f variants of the i for the precomposed i diacritics with marks below, and I also allow below marks to be applied to the post-f i, but an above mark on the i will interrupt the contextual substitution (but an above or below mark on the f will not).
  • Oliver Weiss (Walden Font Co.)
    Oliver Weiss (Walden Font Co.) Posts: 213
    Igor Freiberger said:
    This is the repertoire of ligatures I'm using in my font projects:
    Yes, I am familiar with several of these glyphs :D
    What language uses ccedilla+t? 
  • Thomas Phinney
    Thomas Phinney Posts: 2,898
    John Hudson said:
    I agree that the terminology is imprecise. I sometimes talk about ‘graphically ligating’, to distinguish from a ligature as a technical implementation.
    I call them pseudo-ligatures.

    Not actual ligatures, but they have a similar effect.
  • Peter Baker
    Peter Baker Posts: 190
    Thomas Phinney said:
    I call them pseudo-ligatures.

    Not actual ligatures, but they have a similar effect.

    That what I call them (in my own head and in comments) in my script fonts, where I use them quite a bit.
  • Nick Shinn
    Nick Shinn Posts: 2,216
    In metal, ligatures (e.g. fi) were distinguished from quaints (e.g. ct) and logotypes (e.g. Linotype To, which addressed the issue of kerning).

    That metal ontology is rather more precise than the present understanding of <liga> as activating either a single glyph, or two (in the manner of <calt>).

    It seems to me we call things ligatures, whether the characters represented are contiguous or not, when the default combination of glyphs would otherwise be problematic, and that is why combinations such as fk, dealt with by substituting f.narrow that doesn’t bump into the ascender, may be put in the <liga> feature, when they should really belong in <calt>. After all, the OpenType spec for <liga> clearly states: 
    Replaces a sequence of glyphs with a single glyph.


  • Thomas Phinney
    Thomas Phinney Posts: 2,898
    Nick Shinn said:

    It seems to me we call things ligatures, (…) and that is why combinations such as fk, dealt with by substituting f.narrow that doesn’t bump into the ascender, may be put in the <liga> feature, when they should really belong in <calt>. After all, the OpenType spec for <liga> clearly states: 
    Replaces a sequence of glyphs with a single glyph.

    It would never have occurred to me to even consider putting the f.narrow substitution in 'liga'. It goes against the specification

    Plus, 'calt' works just fine. (And the visual effect is the opposite of ligation, IMO.)
  • Nick Shinn
    Nick Shinn Posts: 2,216
    edited November 2021
    Thomas said:

    against specification

    So, if one constructs a proper-looking fi, with the visual effect of a traditional ligature, but from two separate glyphs, you would put it in <calt>, to observe the specification?
    That wouldn’t be much use to the typographer who goes to turn off <liga>—as is their option—but nothing happens.
  • Thomas Phinney
    Thomas Phinney Posts: 2,898
    I would only consider doing otherwise if I knew that every font-processing engine I cared about would behave properly with a “wrong” lookup type for 'liga'.

    There was certainly a time when most Adobe apps used an engine that cared about such things.
  • Ray Larabie
    Ray Larabie Posts: 1,436
    edited November 2021
    @Oliver Weiss (Walden Font Co.) said:
    What language uses ccedilla+t? 

    Turkish, but I think it's only used as the name Çt. I couldnt find examples of a lowercase combo.
  • John Hudson
    John Hudson Posts: 3,229
    I put contextual pseudo-ligating glyph substitutions in the liga feature, and have not experienced any issues yet. Users expect to be able to disable/enable things that look like ligatures via the liga feature.

    The first font I am aware of that handled ‘ligatures’ in this was was Jelle Bosma’s Cambria, all the way back in the early 2000s.
  • Igor Freiberger
    Igor Freiberger Posts: 280
    edited November 2021
    Oliver Weiss (Walden Font Co.) said:
    Igor Freiberger said:
    This is the repertoire of ligatures I'm using in my font projects:
    Yes, I am familiar with several of these glyphs :D
    What language uses ccedilla+t? 
    Turkish and Osage.
  • Russell McGorman
    Russell McGorman Posts: 262
    Nick Shinn said:
    ... After all, the OpenType spec for <liga> clearly states: 
    Replaces a sequence of glyphs with a single glyph.
    Isn't a sequence of any number of unconnected characters in a glyph within that spec?

    Of course, a downside to a sequence of characters within a glyph is that they'll remain the same while spaces between everything else expands or contracts when tracking is adjusted. Also, users who want ligatures in their typography tend to only want the standard ones.

    I do like the distinction between ligatures, quaints and logotypes but as concepts, or a way of sorting for my own purposes within .liga, .dlig and/or .calt features. 
  • Thomas Phinney
    Thomas Phinney Posts: 2,898
    John Hudson said:

    The first font I am aware of that handled ‘ligatures’ in this was was Jelle Bosma’s Cambria, all the way back in the early 2000s.

    ...but not in general release until January 2007.

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