Text Kerning / Character Spacing?

[ericchesek]

Hi all,

Is there control over the space between each character when using drawText in a paint routine?

Thanks!

[d.healey]

@ericchesek Use g.setFontWithSpacing()

[ericchesek]

@d-healey Excellent! Now if I want to get the width of that text, getStringWidth doesn't work anymore. Is there an alternative for that?

[d.healey]

@ericchesek g.getStringWidth()?

[ericchesek]

@d-healey Are you suggesting to keep using that, or asking for clarification? I am using g.getStringWidth("TEXT"); after setting the font using g.setFontWithSpacing(). The value of g.getStringWidth stays the same as if the spacing was set to 0.

[d.healey]

@ericchesek I was asking for clarification because there is also Engine.getStringWidth() - don't know if that will work...

[d.healey]

Actually g.getStringWidth() works here

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[ericchesek]

@d-healey Oops. You are right. Something else must be wrong in my code. Thanks!
I'm off to debug. :)

[ericchesek]

I see the source of my confusion.
Using g.setFontWithSpacing(font, size, spacing); results in a length of spacing at the end of the string.

For example, if I write
g.getStringWidth("TEXT");
I expect TEXT's width and spacing (shown with underscores) to be calculated as T_E_X_T.
Instead, it is calculated as T_E_X_T_.

So using
g.drawAlignedText("TEXT", [0, 0, this.getWidth(), this.getHeight()], "centred"); doesn't actually center the text due to that kerning offset.

[ericchesek]

Might anyone know how to calculate that extra bit of kerning so I can account for it?

[d.healey]

@ericchesek Perhaps calculate the width of 1 space separately and deduct it from the total width?

[ericchesek]

@d-healey Hmm this might work for monospace fonts, but I get different results based on getting the string width of a space or any character. I don't see why the kerning adds a space at the end of a string. I don't think this is common.

Maybe Christoph can provide some insight? @Christoph-Hart