Hershey is a textual vector font format

Lobsters Hottest Tools

Summary

The article describes the Hershey vector font format, a textual representation of glyphs using a coordinate encoding system where letters map to signed values, and includes examples and links to related resources.

<p><a href="https://lobste.rs/s/ilahdq/hershey_is_textual_vector_font_format">Comments</a></p>
Original Article
View Cached Full Text

Cached at: 05/23/26, 04:47 PM

# hershey Source: [https://wiki.xxiivv.com/site/hershey.html](https://wiki.xxiivv.com/site/hershey.html) ## Hershey is a textual vector format\. A Hershey vector font is a text file in which each line represents a glyph encoded in five parts: - `id\[5\]`: The id of the glyph in decimal\. - `length\[3\]`: The number of points, in decimal\. - `left\[1\]`: The left position of the boundary box\. - `right\[1\]`: The right position of the boundary box\. - `points\[?\]`: A list of points, ending with a linebreak\. A point is made of two characters\(x, y\) representing each a signed value, where capital`R`is 0,`Q`is \-1,`S`is 1, and so on\. For example,`NW`is equal to \-4,5\. Here is an example file containing 12 glyphs: ``` ID---LENLRPOINTS------------------------ 1 9MWRMNV RRMVV RPSTS 2 16MWOMOV ROMSMUNUPSQ ROQSQURUUSVOV 3 11MXVNTMRMPNOPOSPURVTVVU 4 12MWOMOV ROMRMTNUPUSTURVOV 5 12MWOMOV ROMUM ROQSQ ROVUV 6 9MVOMOV ROMUM ROQSQ 7 15MXVNTMRMPNOPOSPURVTVVUVR RSRVR 8 9MWOMOV RUMUV ROQUQ 9 3PTRMRV 10 7NUSMSTRVPVOTOS 11 9MWOMOV RUMOS RQQUV 12 6MVOMOV ROVUV ``` The position " R"\(space followed by capital R\) is special, it means*lifting the pen*, the position that follows will not draw a stroke\. JKLMNOPQ**R**STUVWXYZ\-8\-7\-6\-5\-4\-3\-2\-1**0**\+1\+2\+3\+4\+5\+6\+7\+8- [Hershey Renderer](https://git.sr.ht/~rabbits/hershey), Uxntal - [Hershey Vector Font](https://paulbourke.net/dataformats/hershey/), Paul Bourke - [Hershey Fonts](https://solhsa.com/hershey/fontprev.html) **incoming:**[2026](https://wiki.xxiivv.com/site/2026.html)

Similar Articles

Vector Graphics in Lil

Hacker News Top

This article explores the Lil scripting language in the context of 2D vector graphics, explaining how to represent points, strokes, and paths, and how to manipulate them using the Hershey vector fonts in the Decker ecosystem.

Show HN: An ASCII 3D Rendering Engine

Hacker News Top

GlyphCSS is a JavaScript library that renders textured 3D meshes in the DOM using ASCII characters, supporting various 3D formats and integrating with vanilla JS, React, and Vue.

A font that reads what you wrote

Hacker News Top

semfont is a library that automatically applies typographic styles to text based on word scores for valence, salience, surprise, and certainty to enhance readability.