

The following types of encoding are supported by the PDF file format: Each font in a PDF uses a specific type of encoding, either a standard or a custom one. This refers to the mapping of a character code to a particular glyph (character shape) description. The Multiple Master fonts that are used for this are:Īnother important aspect of font handling is encoding. This way, the document will not be represented exactly as the designer wanted it to, but at least the text won’t reflow. If certain fonts are missing from the PDF file, Adobe Acrobat, and Adobe Reader will automatically try to emulate the missing font by using one of the Multiple Master fonts that are built into these programs. Only a few type foundries actually release fonts with such severe restrictions, but they do exist. Applications that properly honor the licensing policy of such a font will not embed it in a PDF. In TrueType and OpenType fonts, they can add this restriction in the font data. Keep in mind that font foundries can forbid font embedding for certain typefaces through their end-user license agreement.

For subsetted fonts, the font name is preceded by 6 random characters and a plus sign. This means that PDF files with subsetted fonts are smaller than PDF files with embedded fonts. If the “$” character doesn’t appear anywhere in the text, that character is not included in the font.

There are two mechanisms to include fonts in a PDF:

This makes sure that the file can be viewed and printed as it was created by the designer.
