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Some Basic Facts about Fonts
7-6
7
Appendix
Symbol Set
When you print the letter "A," the host computer sends a code corresponding to "A"
(hexadecimal 41 is an example of this) to the machine. This code is referred to as
the character code. The machine stores an internal representation of each
character, and selects from among these character patterns the pattern
corresponding to the received code. In this case, the machine searches for the
pattern for "A," and prints it.
■ The process by which letters are printed
The machine uses a fixed rule to decide which letter or symbol corresponds to the
character code sent from the host computer. For example, the letter "A" is printed for the
hexadecimal code "41." The rule which determines the correspondence between
character codes and printed letters is called the "symbol set."
Fonts and Scalable Fonts
There are two types of fonts available, and these fonts are distinguished by the
type of data from which they are formed.
• Bitmapped fonts
• Scalable fonts
Bitmapped Fonts
Each character of bitmapped fonts are composed of a grid of small dots and stored
in the machine's memory in dot matrix format.
Computer Machine Character
Patterns