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Mathematicians Devise Typefaces Based On Problems of Computational Geometry
KentuckyFC writes: "Typeface design is something of an art. For many centuries, this art has been constrained by the materials available to typographers, mainly lead and wood. More recently, typographers have been freed from this constraint with the advent of digital typesetting and the number of typefaces has mushroomed. Verdana, for example, is designed specifically for computer screens. Now a father and son team of mathematicians have devised a number of typefaces based on problems they have studied in computational geometry. For example, one typeface is inspired by the folds and valleys generated by computational origami designs. Another is based on the open problem of 'whether every disjoint set of unit disks (gears or wheels) in the plane can be visited by a single taut non-self-intersecting conveyor belt.' Interestingly, several of the new typefaces also serve as puzzles in which messages are the solutions."
...before having to decipher those dots and lines
Well, at least now we know why typefaces are designed by artists and not mathematicians.
Traditionally, typeface designers have considered legibility and aesthetics in their work (in addition to typesetting limitations). Apparently those factors are optional now as well.
OK, these are interesting intellectual exercises. But don't try to sell them as examples of typeface design, because that's a creative discipline that goes beyond mathematical questions of "can it be done?"
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
The major point of fonts is to improve communications. Clarity and lack of ambiguity are pretty much the main goals we are striving for, with style being important but not vital. These two decided to have some fun with what could be done, and they succeeded. Good for them. Unfortunately, in achieving the style, they failed on the clarity. Time to turn the page.
Strike while the irony is hot! -- The Freethinker
digits have 0 physical value ever
Dunno about you, but my digits come in pretty handy.
Well, at least now we know why typefaces are designed by artists and not mathematicians.
Next thing you know we're going to have software engineers designing user interfaces and wording menus ... oh wait.
Monospaced font for numbers, so they can line up in a column
What if you need to jot something down and all you have is some glass, a furnace, some aligning pegs...
Oh really? I would find such a thing extremely useful in creating knitting and other needlework designs. There is a fairly standard set of images for creating pattern charts, but a font representing these stitches would be even better - no need for the usually Windows-only pattern creation software that uses these standardized images.
that I would like to see... PS. for all the naysayers here, There are MANY fonts that approach illegibility and are used for style only. I once worked in a sign shop and we had a poster with thousands of fonts. Admittedly we did not use many of them, but occasionally one of the esoteric ones would be perfect for a job. These fonts, as well as being mathematical curiosities could be used for specific circumstances.
Well. This got me curious, so I did some research and found that there are, indeed, such fonts. Thank you for your attitude. If you hadn't felt that such a thing was useless because you didn't happen to see a use for it yourself, I wouldn't have been irritated enough to go looking. You see, that was the reason why my father, then my husband, kept me from ever getting my hands on a computer until he decided he could use one after all.
Typeface work is an addictive drug for mathematicians. Look at the decade lost by Knuth on this....ugh.
Looks kind of similar to Aurebesh..
Thanks for the link, but...did you have a point?
Unity? Screw that: XFCE. Slashdot Beta? Screw that: SoylentNews. Australis? Screw that: Pale Moon. UX developers DIAF
Monospaced font for numbers, so they can line up in a column
Also: slashed zero, as well as some distinction between capital-i and small-l (el).
A good test string that I ran across was "Illegal1 = O0". Also, m/rn/rri (em/ar-en/ar-ar-eye), w/vv (double-u/vee-vee):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IDN_homograph_attack
Martin and Erik Demaine are professors, not students.
Erik Demaine, in particular, is widely considered to be a genius, so perhaps it's fortunate that you have no administrative power over your alma mater.
"They were pure niggers." – Noam Chomsky
Considering your username, I think probably even handier than for most people . . .
"Think about how stupid the average person is. Now, realise that half of them are dumber than that." - George Carlin
You raise a valid point. I was so intent on the font aspect that I didn't see your take on it. Thanks! (sig line notwithstanding - this is an irony-free post.)
Strike while the irony is hot! -- The Freethinker
I suppose it's a sign of my background when I read about a 9-bit representation and my first thought is that that would work horribly as most platforms these days are based on powers of 2. This is the Culture we're talking about though, heh.
Unity? Screw that: XFCE. Slashdot Beta? Screw that: SoylentNews. Australis? Screw that: Pale Moon. UX developers DIAF
Commas are such dangerous weapons... All of the deep seeded psychological issues exposed aside, the incest described by your final sentence would be cleanly done away with by removing most of the commas utilized. You could alternatively replace the word 'then' with 2 words 'followed by' or even easier 'and then' to make your intentions clear.
I may stand corrected in which case I owe your Husband-Father an apology (and child protective services a phone call!)
It sort of reminds me of Bill Meyer's negative space cipher.
Why don't people develop new typefaces to represent concepts in programming so we can have better character identifiers for concepts that we need to type out?
- Zav - Imagine a Beowulf cluster of insensitive clods...
Interesting article, but I don't understand why the conveyor belt problem (as described) is unsolved. Start with one pulley. Obviously a band around it works. Assume a solution exists for some finite number of pulleys, N. Since the support of the pulley locations is compact, one can always and uniquely determine the exterior of the spanning belt. Place an additional pulley exterior to this belt. There are only three topologically relevant cases -- (an pair of in the case of more than two of) the "nearest neighbor" exterior pulleys carry a belt that is "convex" (outside both), "concave" (inside both), or "mixed" (inside one, outside the other). In all three cases it can be shown that one can add the pulley and still satisfy the conditions of the problem. Hence one has 1, N and N+1, a proof by topological induction. The only additional bit of work on the proof is to note that one can avoid problems with pathological interior loopings (if necessary -- I don't really think that it is) or adding the N+1 pulley INSIDE the belt by simply reordering the inductive process for any given pattern to maintain the belt in a maximally convex state as one proceeds, that is starting with any belt and then adding the pulleys ordered by their distance from the original pulley. Not only is there "a" spanning belt, but there will be in most cases an enormous permutation of spanning belts. As in, all of the permutations one can construct by adding pulleys in circular distance order from any pulley treated as the original pulley until they are all entrained.
Even when the experts all agree, they may well be mistaken. --- Bertrand Russell.
I'm sure MIT would be thrilled to hear your opinions; they're really floundering and could use all the help they can get. Email them, they've hired people of your caliber before.
Idiot.
"They were pure niggers." – Noam Chomsky
...is that every scalable font is rendered using computational geometry. All curves in characters are defined with three or more points, and your computing device of choice does a lot of math to render pretty little characters for you.
"False hope is why we'll never run out of natural resources!" - Lewis Black
Have to be fucking readable?
A mathematician decides he wants to learn more about practical problems. He sees a seminar with a nice title: "The Theory of Gears." So he goes. The speaker stands up and begins, "The theory of gears with a real number of teeth is well known ..."
Support microSD: in a post 9/11 world, it is unwise to carry your data on media that you cannot comfortably swallow.
No thanks - I already have a position in academia. I can tell you with complete certainty academia is the epitome of waste and self-congratulatory bullshit.