Quote:
Originally Posted by AlanHK
The software should know it's a space without reference to the font.
If you edit a font and put a glyph in a space slot, the result can be poor. The software will break lines at this character, for instance, expecting it to be a space between words.
I use an old DTP app that writes to postscript, which I have studied as I occasionally modify it to get some effect.
When doing kerned and justified text it outputs one character, then a number to advance before the next. So any spaces are elastic.
I know epub layout doesn't give us that control, but it demonstrates one simple way arbitrary spaces can be created whether they're in the font file or not.
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That is all fine and well, but your coulda woulda shouldas aren't the way fonts work.
For example, it is entirely valid and within the defined purpose of font files to redefine a space as some arbitrary glyph. I can guarantee you there is someone, somewhere, who has good reasons to do just that... no matter how bad you may feel it looks.
There is no reason why rendering software should make a special exception just for *spaces to hardcode their definition rather than allow the font to define it. In fact, there is every reason NOT to.