Wingdings in ePub...?

DesRez · 04-07-2011, 08:09 AM

I'm just embedding some fonts in an epub as a test but I'm having issues with Wingding and Webding fonts displaying properly. I've chucked in some standard Roman fonts and they display fine in Sigil and when testing the book on a Sony ereader. However, the symbol fonts show up fine in Sigil but not on the Sony at all.

Has anyone encountered this before? Is it possible to display Wing/Webdings on eReaders?

Update: I've just tested it in iBooks and the same applies; wing/webdings aren't displaying but the more standard Roman type fonts are...

Jellby · 04-07-2011, 08:55 AM

Note the following from the ePUB specification:

Fonts must not provide mappings for Unicode characters that would change the semantics of the text (e.g. mapping the letter "A" to a biohazard symbol)

I don't know if that's the reason why your dingbat fonts don't work, but they should not be used in ePUB, at least not without remapping them to the private Unicode areas.

DesRez · 04-07-2011, 09:03 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jellby

...at least not without remapping them to the private Unicode areas.

Thanks for that info, any idea how I might go about mapping them to Unicode areas?

Apologies for my ignorance on this subject! I've now found references to Unicode Private Use Characters on the web but I've never encountered them before.

pholy · 04-07-2011, 09:53 AM

Assuming you had an open license font with wingdings in it, you could use FontForge to re-map the characters into a Private Use area. Then you could embed your new font into your epub file for your book.

And please republish your new font (probably required by the license anyway) so the rest of us can use it too.

04-07-2011, 08:09 AM	#1
DesRez Junior Member Posts: 4 Karma: 10 Join Date: Apr 2011 Device: Sony, iPad	Wingdings in ePub...? I'm just embedding some fonts in an epub as a test but I'm having issues with Wingding and Webding fonts displaying properly. I've chucked in some standard Roman fonts and they display fine in Sigil and when testing the book on a Sony ereader. However, the symbol fonts show up fine in Sigil but not on the Sony at all. Has anyone encountered this before? Is it possible to display Wing/Webdings on eReaders? Update: I've just tested it in iBooks and the same applies; wing/webdings aren't displaying but the more standard Roman type fonts are... Last edited by DesRez; 04-07-2011 at 08:14 AM.

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04-07-2011, 08:55 AM	#2
Jellby frumious Bandersnatch Posts: 7,515 Karma: 18512745 Join Date: Jan 2008 Location: Spaniard in Sweden Device: Cybook Orizon, Kobo Aura	Note the following from the ePUB specification: Fonts must not provide mappings for Unicode characters that would change the semantics of the text (e.g. mapping the letter "A" to a biohazard symbol) I don't know if that's the reason why your dingbat fonts don't work, but they should not be used in ePUB, at least not without remapping them to the private Unicode areas.

04-07-2011, 09:53 AM	#4
pholy Booklegger Posts: 1,801 Karma: 7999816 Join Date: Jun 2009 Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada Device: BeBook(1 & 2010), PEZ, PRS-505, Kobo BT, PRS-T1, Playbook, Kobo Touch	Assuming you had an open license font with wingdings in it, you could use FontForge to re-map the characters into a Private Use area. Then you could embed your new font into your epub file for your book. And please republish your new font (probably required by the license anyway) so the rest of us can use it too.

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