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<head>
<title>UK TeX FAQ -- question label getbitmap</title>
</head><body>
<h3>Acquiring bitmap fonts</h3>
<p/>When CTAN was young, most people would start using TeX
with a 300 dots-per-inch (dpi) laser printer, and sets of Computer
Modern bitmap fonts for this resolution are available on CTAN.
(There are separate sets for write-black and write-white printers, as
well as sets at 120 dpi and 240 dpi.)
<p/>Over the years, there have been regular requests that CTAN should hold
a wider range of resolutions, but they were resisted for two reasons:
<ul>
<li> The need to decide which printers to generate fonts for.  The
  broad-brush approach taken for 300 dpi printers was (more or less)
  justified back then, given the dominance of certain printer
  &lsquo;engines&rsquo;, but nowadays one could not make any such assumption.
<li> Given the above, justifying the space taken up by a huge array
  of bitmap fonts.
</ul>
Fortunately, (La)TeX distribution technology has put a stop to these
arguments: most (if not all) current distributions generate bitmap
fonts as needed, and cache them for later re-use.  The impatient
user, who is determined that all bitmap fonts should be created once
and for all, may be supported by scripts such as <i>allcm</i>
(distributed with TeX Live, at least; otherwise such a
person should consult &ldquo;<a href="FAQ-useMF.html">the use of Metafont</a>)&rdquo;.
<p/>If your output is to a PostScript-capable device, or if your output is
destined to be converted to PDF, you should switch to
using Type 1 versions of the CM fonts.  Two free
sets are available; the older (<i>bakoma</i>) is
somewhat less well produced than the <i>bluesky</i> fonts, which were
originally professionally produced and sold, but were then released
for general public use by their originators Y&amp;Y and Bluesky Research,
in association with the AMS and other scientific publishers
(they are nowadays available under the SIL&rsquo;s Open Fonts Licence).  The
two sets contain slightly different ranges of fonts, but you are
advised to use the 
<i>bluesky</i> set except when <i>bakoma</i> is for some reason
absolutely unavoidable.  In recent years, several other &lsquo;Metafont&rsquo; fonts
have been converted to Type 1 format; it&rsquo;s common never to need to
generate bitmap fonts for any purpose other than previewing (see

<a href="FAQ-PSpreview.html">&ldquo;previewing documents with Type 1 fonts&rdquo;</a>),
if even then.
<p/>More modern fonts may be used in place of the Computer Modern set.  The
<a href="FAQ-ECfonts.html">EC fonts</a> and the 
<a href="FAQ-uselmfonts.html">Latin Modern fonts</a> are both close relatives of
Computer Modern with wider ranges of glyphs to offer.
<dl>
<dt><tt><i>BaKoMa fonts</i></tt><dd><a href="http://www.tex.ac.uk/tex-archive/fonts/cm/ps-type1/bakoma.zip">fonts/cm/ps-type1/bakoma</a> (or <a href="http://www.tex.ac.uk/tex-archive/fonts/cm/ps-type1/bakoma/">browse the directory</a>)
<dt><tt><i>Bluesky fonts</i></tt><dd>Distributed as part of
  <a href="http://www.tex.ac.uk/tex-archive/fonts/amsfonts.zip">fonts/amsfonts</a> (or <a href="http://www.tex.ac.uk/tex-archive/fonts/amsfonts/">browse the directory</a>)
<dt><tt><i>CM fonts (write-black printers)</i></tt><dd><a href="http://www.tex.ac.uk/tex-archive/fonts/cm/pk/pk300.zip">fonts/cm/pk/pk300.zip</a>
<dt><tt><i>CM fonts (write-white printers)</i></tt><dd><a href="http://www.tex.ac.uk/tex-archive/fonts/cm/pk/pk300w.zip">fonts/cm/pk/pk300w.zip</a>
<dt><tt><i>EC fonts (Type 1 format)</i></tt><dd><a href="http://www.tex.ac.uk/tex-archive/fonts/ps-type1/cm-super.zip">fonts/ps-type1/cm-super</a> (or <a href="http://www.tex.ac.uk/tex-archive/fonts/ps-type1/cm-super/">browse the directory</a>)
<dt><tt><i>Latin Modern fonts</i></tt><dd><a href="http://www.tex.ac.uk/tex-archive/fonts/lm.zip">fonts/lm</a> (or <a href="http://www.tex.ac.uk/tex-archive/fonts/lm/">browse the directory</a>)
</dl>
<p/><p/><p/><p>This question on the Web: <a href="http://www.tex.ac.uk/cgi-bin/texfaq2html?label=getbitmap">http://www.tex.ac.uk/cgi-bin/texfaq2html?label=getbitmap</a>
</body>