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Point (typography)
In typography, the point is the smallest unit of measure. It is used for measuring font size, leading, and other items on a printed page. The size of the point has varied throughout printing's history. Since the 18th century, the size of a point has been between 0.18 and 0.4 millimeters. Following the advent of desktop publishing in the 1980s and 1990s, digital printing has largely supplanted the letterpress printing and has established the desktop publishing (DTP) point as the de facto standard. The DTP point is defined as 1⁄72 of an inch (or exactly 0.3527 mm) and, as with earlier American point sizes, is considered to be 1⁄12 of a pica.
In metal type, the point size of a font describes the height of the metal body on which that font's characters were cast. In digital type, letters of a computer font are designed around an imaginary space called an em square. When a point size of a font is specified, the font is scaled so that its em square has a side length of that particular length in points. Although the letters of a font usually fit within the font's em square, there is not necessarily any size relationship between the two, so the point size does not necessarily correspond to any measurement of the size of the letters on the printed page.
The point was first established by the Milanese typographer, Francesco Torniella da Novara (c. 1490 – 1589) in his 1517 alphabet, L'Alfabeto. The construction of the alphabet is the first based on logical measurement called "Punto", which corresponds to the ninth part of the height of the letters or the thickness of the principal stroke.
A measurement in points can be represented in three different ways. For example, 14 points (1 pica plus 2 points) can be written:
There have been many definitions of a "point" since the advent of typography. Traditional continental European points at about 0.375 mm are usually a bit larger than English points at around 0.350 mm.
The Truchet point, the first modern typographic point, was 1⁄144 of a French inch or 1⁄1728 of the royal foot.[citation needed] It was invented by the French clergyman Sébastien Truchet. During the metrication of France amid its revolution, a 1799 law declared the meter to be exactly 443.296 French lines long. This established a length to the royal foot of 9000⁄27706 m or about 325 mm. The Truchet point therefore became equal to 15625⁄83118 mm or about 0.187986 mm. It has also been cited as exactly 0.188 mm.
The Fournier point was established by Pierre Simon Fournier in 1737. The system of Fournier was based on a different French foot of c. 298 mm. With the usual convention that 1 foot equals 12 inches, 1 inch (pouce) was divided into 12 lines (lignes) and 1 line was further divided into 6 typographic points (points typographiques). One Fournier point is about 0.0135 English inches.
Fournier printed a reference scale of 144 points over two inches; however, it was too rough to accurately measure a single point.
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Point (typography) AI simulator
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Point (typography)
In typography, the point is the smallest unit of measure. It is used for measuring font size, leading, and other items on a printed page. The size of the point has varied throughout printing's history. Since the 18th century, the size of a point has been between 0.18 and 0.4 millimeters. Following the advent of desktop publishing in the 1980s and 1990s, digital printing has largely supplanted the letterpress printing and has established the desktop publishing (DTP) point as the de facto standard. The DTP point is defined as 1⁄72 of an inch (or exactly 0.3527 mm) and, as with earlier American point sizes, is considered to be 1⁄12 of a pica.
In metal type, the point size of a font describes the height of the metal body on which that font's characters were cast. In digital type, letters of a computer font are designed around an imaginary space called an em square. When a point size of a font is specified, the font is scaled so that its em square has a side length of that particular length in points. Although the letters of a font usually fit within the font's em square, there is not necessarily any size relationship between the two, so the point size does not necessarily correspond to any measurement of the size of the letters on the printed page.
The point was first established by the Milanese typographer, Francesco Torniella da Novara (c. 1490 – 1589) in his 1517 alphabet, L'Alfabeto. The construction of the alphabet is the first based on logical measurement called "Punto", which corresponds to the ninth part of the height of the letters or the thickness of the principal stroke.
A measurement in points can be represented in three different ways. For example, 14 points (1 pica plus 2 points) can be written:
There have been many definitions of a "point" since the advent of typography. Traditional continental European points at about 0.375 mm are usually a bit larger than English points at around 0.350 mm.
The Truchet point, the first modern typographic point, was 1⁄144 of a French inch or 1⁄1728 of the royal foot.[citation needed] It was invented by the French clergyman Sébastien Truchet. During the metrication of France amid its revolution, a 1799 law declared the meter to be exactly 443.296 French lines long. This established a length to the royal foot of 9000⁄27706 m or about 325 mm. The Truchet point therefore became equal to 15625⁄83118 mm or about 0.187986 mm. It has also been cited as exactly 0.188 mm.
The Fournier point was established by Pierre Simon Fournier in 1737. The system of Fournier was based on a different French foot of c. 298 mm. With the usual convention that 1 foot equals 12 inches, 1 inch (pouce) was divided into 12 lines (lignes) and 1 line was further divided into 6 typographic points (points typographiques). One Fournier point is about 0.0135 English inches.
Fournier printed a reference scale of 144 points over two inches; however, it was too rough to accurately measure a single point.