Hard to read (bitmap?) fonts in old 16 bit application.
File license
Fair use/fair dealing exception
Hi,
for the moment I use DOSBOX as a way to get an "ancient" Windows16 bits application running.
It is a dictionary, and runs in 16 bits mode.
The annoying thing about this application (MTXc) is that it uses what I think it partially uses custom bitmap fonts, which are not that legible.
I think they were already hard to read when the program was originally launched, on a real DOS/Windows 3.11 with a CRT monitor.
I just wonder, is there any way to make the application use another (Truetype) font instead of the (hardcoded?) one?
The application is a dictionary, and translates back and forth to several other languages and is very compact.
But I wonder, was this program really made for Windows 3.1x ?
If it was made for Windows 3.0 or Windows 2.x, things are different.
Windows 2.x, for example, had no concept of proportional fonts
Windows 3.0 had, but required the famous Adobe Type Manager to be installed,
in order to support scalable, truetypish-fonts.
Now two ideas come to mind how to fix your problem..
a) Edit Win.ini and insert some replacments font there.
Watch out for the [font] section.
1[fonts] 2Modern (Plotter)=MODERN.FON 3Script (Plotter)=SCRIPT.FON 4Roman (Plotter)=ROMAN.FON 5Small Fonts (EGA res)=SMALLB.FON 6Symbol 8,10,12,14,18,24 (EGA res)=SYMBOLB.FON 7Times New Roman 8,10 (EGA res)=TIMESB.FON 8Arial 8,10 (EGA res)=ARIALB.FON 9MS Serif 8,10,12,14,18,24 (EGA res)=SERIFB.FON 10Courier 8,10,12,15 (EGA res)=COURB.FON 11MS Sans Serif 8,10,12,14,18,24 (EGA res)=SSERIFB.FON 12Arial (TrueType)=ARIAL.FOT 13Arial Bold (TrueType)=ARIALBD.FOT 14Arial Bold Italic (TrueType)=ARIALBI.FOT 15Arial Italic (TrueType)=ARIALI.FOT 16Courier New (TrueType)=COUR.FOT 17Courier New Bold (TrueType)=COURBD.FOT 18Courier New Italic (TrueType)=COURI.FOT 19Times New Roman (TrueType)=TIMES.FOT 20Times New Roman Bold (TrueType)=TIMESBD.FOT 21Times New Roman Bold Italic (TrueType)=TIMESBI.FOT 22Times New Roman Italic (TrueType)=TIMESI.FOT 23Courier New Bold Italic (TrueType)=COURBI.FOT 24WingDings (TrueType)=WINGDING.FOT 25Symbol (TrueType)=SYMBOL.FOT
"Time, it seems, doesn't flow. For some it's fast, for some it's slow.
In what to one race is no time at all, another race can rise and fall..." - The Minstrel
Hmm, I don't know if it would also work on Windows 3.0.
It is a very old program, would really have to search for the original installation media.
I tried font substitution, it works a bit, but then some fonts look better, others become a bit smaller.
So I tried installing Adobe Type Manager 3.02, but it seems to be unable to copy the NDL file.
Maybe something to do with floppy disk emulation that is not working in Win3.1 under DOSBOX?
I tried both options (in Virtualbox, I couln't get Adobe Type Manager to work in DOSBOX).
The fonts are better readable in both cases, but they are very small.
I suppose there is no way to do force an application to use larger fonts, right?
