Technical & legal background using copyrighted fonts in custom road signs in PowerPoint

"Andre G. Isaak" wrote

| I downloaded the font in question. If you want to teach the kids how to
| 'do the job right' this font is really not a good choice. The quality of
| the outlines is horrible. Plus Mac OS already includes a well-designed
| font specifically designed for signs (DIN), so why not just use that
| instead?
|

The idea was to provide a legal, ready-made product,
with an official font, that works with both Mac and
Windows. What good is a font that's only on Macs?

In article ,
"Mayayana" wrote:

"Andre G. Isaak" wrote

| I downloaded the font in question. If you want to teach the kids how to
| 'do the job right' this font is really not a good choice. The quality of
| the outlines is horrible. Plus Mac OS already includes a well-designed
| font specifically designed for signs (DIN), so why not just use that
| instead?
|

The idea was to provide a legal, ready-made product,
with an official font, that works with both Mac and
Windows. What good is a font that's only on Macs?

Most of the OPs questions have focussed on Macs, so I was answering with
respect to Macs. DIN is available on both platforms, though I don't know
if is included with Windows.

but if there is no appropriate font included with both macOS and Windows
and they need a free font, surely there are better options available
than this one. There are numerous free sans serif fonts available
through Google fonts which are much higher quality than Roadgeek.

Andre

--
To email remove 'invalid' & replace 'gm' with well known Google mail service.

On 2017-09-11 00:58:45 +0000, Mayayana said:
"Your Name" wrote

There's nothing that is guranteed to be on every computer.

HTML. And fonts can be embedded, base 64 encoded.
There may be a size limit. I'm not sure about that.

But you still need an app to be able to edit the HTML ... easily, so
that rules out manually tweaking the underlying code in a text editor.

There are no guaranteed apps that are capable of what is required by
the person who posted the original questions.




MS Office is certainly not guaranteed. Many people have
MS Word, but typically it's only students and people who
work in offices. Fewer have Powerpoint.

I assumed it had to be Powerpoint. Why else would
anyone use such a limited format with such limited
support? But that's typical of people who use MS Office:
They're usually people who think their computer *is*
MS Office, so they assume *everyone* uses MS Office,
so even if they just need to save a phone number in
a text file they fire up MS Word and save it as a 100
KB DOC file.

PowerPoint is often (incorrectly) used as a desktop publishing / page
layout package, despite the fact that it's not actually designed to do
that. The reason is because it seems much easier than using Word to do
the same thing (really only because Word makes so many of it's supposed
page layout features more difficult to find, but that's awful to use as
well).

On 2017-09-11 01:12:24 +0000, Mayayana said:
"Your Name" wrote

The five year-olds are too busy explaining how to take photos on their
phone to older people.

Not any more. Some busy-bodies stuck their noses in and now you have to
limit the amount of "screen time" kids have .. which pretty much
destroys the ideas of other busy-bodies who are trying to get "computer
coding" as a necessity in kindergartens and junior schools.

I'd like to think that's true, but there are an awfully
lot of idiots who think the way to make kids intelligent
is to give them anything digital. I recently came across
one of those dawn-breaks-on-Marblehead studies where
some bright bulbs concluded that iPads alone don't
necessarily increase learning! And this week I came
across a very dangerous looking phenomenon:

https://xqsuperschool.org/

Their presentation is unreadable jargon about curing
the old-fashioned design of schools. It seems to be
connected to Bill Gates and his breathtakingly arrogant
drive to not only get MS products into schools but also
to tell educators how to teach. The fact that he knows
nothing about it doesn't deter him. He thinks he's a
genius who understands everything better than anyone
else.

It astonishes me that people might think a 5 year old
should use a computer when they're still learning to use
their senses and to relate to other people. It astonishes
me that anyone could be so simple-minded as to just
assume that more digital is more smart. I'd hate to be
raising kids these days. They're not brilliant with computers.
They're well trained by commercial interests to use
commercial services through digital media. It's no different
from kids a generation ago who never left the TV set.
And parents then thought their kids were geniuses because
they were so adept with the remote control. Now the
kids shop, play idiotic games and follow celebrity Twitter
accounts on digital devices their parents think it's STEM
education.

Over the last few years schools here in New Zealand have been pushing
parents into buying their kids laptops or tablets to use at school -
not just senior / high school kids, but primary / junior schools kids
as young as 6. If schools think these things are a necessity (which
they definitely are not), then the schools should be supplying them for
the kids to use. Not forcing parents into buying them.

It's just the usual blinkered "we must use technology". The problem is
that few teachers or schools actually know what to do with such devices
as a teaching tool.

Then there's the current silliness of wanting to teach little kids
computer coding. They've already got too many trained people leaving
university not able to find jobs, and complaingin there aren't enough
ditch diggers. :-\

It's just another of the ridiculous stupidities in the eduction system
these days.

In last week's newspaper they were complaining about kids becoming
worse at the basics of reading, writing, mathematics ... it's these
basic skills, taught properly and normally, that schools should be
teaching, and teaching properly. Not playing around about on a laptop /
tablet, not playing silly sports, and not sticking their noses into
what kids have in their lunchboxes.

On 2017-09-11, Mayayana wrote:
"Your Name" wrote

There's nothing that is guranteed to be on every computer.

HTML. And fonts can be embedded, base 64 encoded. There may be a
size limit. I'm not sure about that.

Assuming a modern browser, yep.

I assumed it had to be Powerpoint. Why else would anyone use such a
limited format with such limited support?

For page layout? Neophytes. The troll who asked this question is a clear
example of one.

But that's typical of people who use MS Office: They're usually people
who think their computer *is* MS Office, so they assume *everyone*
uses MS Office, so even if they just need to save a phone number in a
text file they fire up MS Word and save it as a 100 KB DOC file.

Or to send you a photo (which Word automatically degrades the quality of
upon import/export). That's always lovely... : )

--
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I often ignore posts from Google. Use a real news client instead.

JR

On 2017-09-11, Your Name wrote:
On 2017-09-11 00:58:45 +0000, Mayayana said:
"Your Name" wrote

There's nothing that is guranteed to be on every computer.

HTML. And fonts can be embedded, base 64 encoded. There may be a
size limit. I'm not sure about that.

But you still need an app to be able to edit the HTML

Any plain text editor will do that just fine.

... easily, so that rules out manually tweaking the underlying code in
a text editor.

Nope.

--
E-mail sent to this address may be devoured by my ravenous SPAM filter.
I often ignore posts from Google. Use a real news client instead.

JR

On Sun, 10 Sep 2017 20:58:45 -0400, Mayayana
wrote:

HTML. And fonts can be embedded, base 64 encoded.
There may be a size limit. I'm not sure about that.

MS Office is certainly not guaranteed. Many people have
MS Word, but typically it's only students and people who
work in offices. Fewer have Powerpoint.

I assumed it had to be Powerpoint. Why else would
anyone use such a limited format with such limited
support? But that's typical of people who use MS Office:
They're usually people who think their computer *is*
MS Office, so they assume *everyone* uses MS Office,
so even if they just need to save a phone number in
a text file they fire up MS Word and save it as a 100
KB DOC file.

Mayayana brings up good points, where Mayayana says PPT isn't always there,
and I can't disagree other than to say that I have personally never seen a
PC that had MS Office that didn't have the main suite (word, ppt, & excel
at the very least).

Do machines exist that don't have MS Office? Sure.
Do machines with MS Office exist that don't have PPT? Probably.

But we have to pick SOMETHING.
If not MS Office PowerPoint, what?

Mayayana says it could be Word that we choose but Word is, IMHO, far harder
to use than PPT for something as simple as a sign, due to the text-box and
anchor bother, page wrap, and margin formatting hell (among other
Word-specific hells).

Powerpoint is designed to be a set of single page slides, which fits a set
of signs perfectly.

If not PowerPoint, then what do you suggest that is already on everyone's
computer and which they know well and which can edit the slides as needed?

I'm all ears if you have a better idea. The draft is due tomorrow.

On Mon, 11 Sep 2017 13:57:09 +1200, Your Name wrote:

There are no guaranteed apps that are capable of what is required by
the person who posted the original questions.

You all bring up good points but you have to PICK SOMETHING so if it's not
MS Office, what is it that is editable that is also WYSIWYG on both Mac and
PC that everyone already has and knows how to use?

If not MS Office, then what?

"Your Name" wrote

| HTML. And fonts can be embedded, base 64 encoded.
| There may be a size limit. I'm not sure about that.
|
| But you still need an app to be able to edit the HTML ... easily, so
| that rules out manually tweaking the underlying code in a text editor.
|

All that's required is a text editor. HTML and CSS
are plain text. But it does require that the author
know HTML well enough to get the layout they want.
And all the reecipients are guaranteed to be able
to load and read an HTML file. Images can also be
embedded as base 64. HTML is by far the most
adaptable format for graphical pages that need
to display on any system.

If the author is not experienced with HTML there
are plenty of free "wysiwyg" HTML editors. But it
does require some experience to get the page design
to behave.

In article , Mayayana
wrote:


All that's required is a text editor. HTML and CSS
are plain text. But it does require that the author
know HTML well enough to get the layout they want.
And all the reecipients are guaranteed to be able
to load and read an HTML file. Images can also be
embedded as base 64. HTML is by far the most
adaptable format for graphical pages that need
to display on any system.

the problem is html does not guarantee a particular layout, making it a
very poor choice.

"Chaya Eve" wrote

| If not PowerPoint, then what do you suggest that is already on everyone's
| computer and which they know well and which can edit the slides as needed?
|

I'm sorry if I've started a wild goose chase. I didn't
catch the part where you needed everyone to be able
to edit it. I thought you were writing and just needed
many people on different systems to be able to view it.

I wouldn't necessarily recommend Word. I was just
saying that more people have Word.

I guess it's really you who knows best. If everyone
really does have, and is adept at, PPT then that does
seem to be your obvious choice. Then I guess you'd
have to tell the Mac people to install the font.

I'm not clear about the needs of the project. If I
needed to print a sign I'd do it as a BMP in Paint
Shop Pro or some similar graphic program. I have
a brother who does signs. He generally uses a vinyl
plotter. But I assume you have a low budget and
you're just going to print out letters on a piece
of printing paper. If that's the case then just about
any graphic editor should do it. Paint.Net and GIMP
are both free... Then again, I might just be introducing
another wild goose chase. Graphic editors have other
limitations. For instance, everyone would then need
to install the font and a layout would probably
be redone more easily than edited. I don't see
why they can't just all download and install the font,
but you're the only one who knows all the requirements
of this project.

"Your Name" wrote

| It's just another of the ridiculous stupidities in the eduction system
| these days.
|
| In last week's newspaper they were complaining about kids becoming
| worse at the basics of reading, writing, mathematics ... it's these
| basic skills, taught properly and normally, that schools should be
| teaching, and teaching properly. Not playing around about on a laptop /
| tablet, not playing silly sports, and not sticking their noses into
| what kids have in their lunchboxes.
|

There was a fascinating and shocking article
last week in the NYT:

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/02/t...hers-tech.html

(Requires cookies enabled.)

Tech companies seducing teachers into being salespeople
for their stuff. What really surprises me (in addition to the
sheer arrogance and sleaze of MS/Apple/Facebook/Google/etc)
is that no one is overseeing these things. Why is a company
like Google able to deal directly with teachers? Why don't
their salespeople have to go through state-level administrators
to get gadgets into classrooms? Maybe those people are
all so hypnotized by tech that they just don't think about
what they're doing.

My ladyfriend is a retired kindergarten teacher. She used
to be forced to get Macs in order to use Federal funding to
get things like tables and shelving. The Macs just sat in
the corner, unsuitable for 5-6 year olds but assigned to
her classroom and thus not eligible to be put to use
elsewhere. I'm guessing it was Steve Jobs's lobbyists who
are to thank for that.

On Sun, 10 Sep 2017 18:59:56 -0600, "Andre G. Isaak"
wrote:

I downloaded the font in question. If you want to teach the kids how to
'do the job right' this font is really not a good choice. The quality of
the outlines is horrible. Plus Mac OS already includes a well-designed
font specifically designed for signs (DIN), so why not just use that
instead?

If you can suggest a better font, I'm all ears.

However I'm not sure what you mean by "the quality of those outlines".
http://wetakepic.com/images/2017/09/11/chaya0.jpg

Can you just post a picture of your rendition of this sign for us so we can
compare based on what you said and did?

Rest assured I'm not beholden to any particular font - it just has to be a
font that contains all the symbols used in road signs and which contains
all the legibility issues and narrow widths needed for road signs.

If you know of a better free font that is both on Mac and Windows in
Microsoft Office, then I'm all ears since the project proposal is due
tomorrow.

Here are some samples from my PowerPoint presentation where all I ask is
that you show us where you think the "quality of those outlines is
horrible" by simply picking one of the signs below to print out in your
preferred font so we can see one of them compared side by side.

http://wetakepic.com/images/2017/09/11/chaya1.jpg
http://wetakepic.com/images/2017/09/11/chaya2.jpg
http://wetakepic.com/images/2017/09/11/chaya3.jpg
http://wetakepic.com/images/2017/09/11/chaya4.jpg
http://wetakepic.com/images/2017/09/11/chaya5.jpg
http://wetakepic.com/images/2017/09/11/chaya6.jpg
http://wetakepic.com/images/2017/09/11/chaya7.jpg

In article , Mayayana
wrote:

There was a fascinating and shocking article
last week in the NYT:

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/02/t...hers-tech.html

(Requires cookies enabled.)

no it doesn't.

Tech companies seducing teachers into being salespeople
for their stuff. What really surprises me (in addition to the
sheer arrogance and sleaze of MS/Apple/Facebook/Google/etc)
is that no one is overseeing these things. Why is a company
like Google able to deal directly with teachers? Why don't
their salespeople have to go through state-level administrators
to get gadgets into classrooms? Maybe those people are
all so hypnotized by tech that they just don't think about
what they're doing.

technology in schools is a *very* good thing.

those kids will be growing up in a world with all sorts of technology
that people today can't even imagine, and they *need* to know how it
all works.

My ladyfriend is a retired kindergarten teacher. She used
to be forced to get Macs in order to use Federal funding to
get things like tables and shelving. The Macs just sat in
the corner, unsuitable for 5-6 year olds but assigned to
her classroom and thus not eligible to be put to use
elsewhere.

that just means the school system she worked in was very ****ed up.

I'm guessing it was Steve Jobs's lobbyists who
are to thank for that.

you guessed wrong.

On Sun, 10 Sep 2017 21:25:09 -0400, Mayayana
wrote:

The idea was to provide a legal, ready-made product,
with an official font, that works with both Mac and
Windows. What good is a font that's only on Macs?

There is a LOT that people don't seem to know that goes into the design of
a road-sign font, such as the parts that you cut out of the "A" have to be
really tiny, because letters are often stick-on vinyl.
https://mutcd.fhwa.dot.gov/res-ia_clearview_font.htm

Also everything has to be legible at night (didn't anyone read the articles
I quoted?) where even the government screwed up with the Clearview font,
which made them revert back to Gothic.
https://www.citylab.com/transportati...arview/427068/

I'd use Gothic or Clearview if I could - but they're not freely available.
But I'm not beholden to the roadgeek font.
If someone has a better road-sign font, now is the time since the proposal
is due tomorrow.

Just don't be naive when proposing a font (or an editing program).

The font set has to include ALL the road-sign doohickies such as turn
arrows and u-turn symbols and interstate symbols and outline borders etc.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...hard-read.html

The font has to be narrow enough to fit words legibly on a limited space
sign. The numbers have to have specific legibility offsets.
https://qz.com/605695/font-designers...highway-signs/

What that particular Mac user is doing is picking a font that likely
doesn't have ANY of those legibility capabilities.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clearview_(typeface)

Given that a road-sign font is far more complex than most users here seem
to realize, I think that Mac-only font would fail for so many reasons that
it wouldn't even be funny - but I'm willing to see a side-by-side
comparison of the Mac font against the Roadside Geek font any time.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highway_Gothic

To that end, I did ask Andre G. Isaak to prove his assertion that "the
quality of the outlines is horrible" compared to his favorite Mac font
simply by posting a comparable screenshot to the signs I posted for him.
http://wetakepic.com/images/2017/09/11/chaya1.jpg