PC Fonts consists of three files:
.AFM - Adobe Font Metric
.PFB - Printer Font Binary
.INF - Font Information
Windows Screen fonts consists of:
.PFM - Printer Font Metrics - contains only metric information.
FON - Windows bitmap screen fonts and metrics information.
* Postscript printers and HP PCL printer require .PFM files.
Windows screen fonts are 96 dpi at standard VGA 640x480 resolution.
Mac Fonts consists of three files:
Adobe Font Metrics,
Bitmaps screen fonts,
and Outlines files.
Mac screen font:
Contain bitmap font
and metrics font.
Macintosh bitmaps are 72 dpi.
Font Parts
Bitmap font (Screen Fonts) - A pattern of dots (bits) that closely resembles a character shape in a given typeface, point size, rotation and resolution. Bitmapped characters used as screen fonts tend to be jagged, as opposed to smooth characters generated from outlines. Bitmaps cannot be scaled without distortion and require consider-able storage space. They provide screen pictures to your applications of what certain fonts look like at specific sizes.
On the Macintosh, when applications are launched, they read the system for installed bitmaps and then build the font menu from this information. These bitmap fonts can be installed in the system file, with a font utility, or if using System 7.1, in the Fonts folder. If you ever need to use a font size in your application different from those sizes installed, then the operating system will scale the nearest bitmap size to approximate the requested size on screen unless you have ATM. Bitmapped fonts for both System 6 and System 7 have numbers appended to the ends of their names. Numbers correlate with the bitmap sizes contained in the bitmap file. For example, the "Adobe Garamond Bold 18" file describes the appearance of all characters in the Adobe Garamond Bold typeface when displayed at 18 point size. Bitmaps of many sizes and styles are usually grouped together within a single suitcase file. Under System 6, the contents of suitcase files may be examined with the Font/DA version 3.8 or later. Under System 7, double-clicking on a suitcase file will open the file and display the bitmaps, just as if the suitcase file were a folder.
Outline font-A method of describing the shapes of the characters in a typeface by a program. This mathematical representation of lines and curves is resolution-independent and device-independent.
Outline fonts (Printer fonts) contain mathematical descriptions of each character in a typeface's character set. This description applies to all sizes. All Adobe Postscript out-line fonts have the slanted A icon with horizontal lines in the background. Postscript printers have the ability to scale outline fonts to produce high quality, high resolution output. With ATM installed, outline fonts make it possible to display all sizes of text at maximum screen resolution, as if bitmaps for all possible sizes were available.