Font and shape files (SHX) are compiled from shape definition files (SHP). You can create or modify shape definition files with a text editor or word processor that saves files in ASCII format.
The syntax of the shape description for each shape or character is the same regardless of the final use (shape or font) for that shape description. If a shape definition file is to be used as a font file, the first entry in the file describes the font itself rather than a shape within the file. If this initial entry describes a shape, the file is used as a shape file.
Each line in a shape definition file can contain up to 128 characters. Longer lines cannot be compiled. Because the program ignores blank lines and text to the right of a semicolon, you can embed comments in shape definition files.
Each shape description has a header line of the following form and is followed by one or more lines containing specification bytes, separated by commas and terminated by a 0.
*shapenumber,defbytes,shapenamespecbyte1,specbyte2,specbyte3,...,0
The following list describes the fields of a shape description:
A number, unique to the file, between 1 and 258 (and up to 32768 for Unicode fonts), and preceded by an asterisk (*). Non-Unicode font files use the shape numbers 256, 257, and 258 for the symbolic identifiers Degree_Sign, Plus_Or_Minus_Sign, and Diameter_Symbol. For Unicode fonts these glyphs appear at the U+00B0, U+00B1, and U+2205 shape numbers and are part of the “Latin Extended-A” subset.
Text fonts (files containing shape definitions for each character) require specific numbers corresponding to the value of each character in the ASCII code; other shapes can be assigned any numbers.
A shape specification byte. Each specification byte is a code that defines either a vector length and direction or one of a number of special codes. A specification byte can be expressed in the shape definition file as either a decimal or hexadecimal value. If the first character of a specification byte is a 0 (zero), the two characters that follow are interpreted as hexadecimal values.
A simple shape specification byte contains vector length and direction encoded into one specification byte.
Text fonts are files of shape definitions with shape numbers corresponding to an ASCII code for each character.
A single Unicode font, due to its large character set, is capable of supporting all languages and platforms. Unicode shape definition files are virtually identical in format and syntax to regular shape definition files.
Some languages, such as Japanese, use text fonts with thousands of non-ASCII characters. In order for drawings to contain such text, the product supports a special form of shape definition file called a Big Font file.
You can modify shape definition files to improve their ability to display superscripts and subscripts.