[Fontconfig] Fontconfig, Pango, vertical text & Windows...

[Jeremy Moles]

Hello everyone; I've noticed a bit more traffic on these lists lately
with behdad having turned over maintainership, and so I figured I'd pose
my question here as well.

The bottom line, really, is that I'm looking for some way (any way!) to
get vertical text support on Windows using Pango. When using Linux our
application behaves perfectly when requesting a vertical layout with
Pango. On Windows, however, Pango doesn't use the Fontconfig backend
(and I've not been able to figure out how to encourage/force it to).

I've spent some time trying to hack Pango itself to no avail; I just
don't have enough understanding to even know where to begin. Therefore,
I'd like to try configuring Pango to use the Fontconfig/FT2 backends on
Windows instead. I'm not even sure if I'm using the right terminology
here, so please bear with me. :)

My question is: if I go down this path, is this likely (or even
possible) to solve my issue with needing vertical text in Windows? I
understand Pango's problems aren't related to Fontconfig, but I'm hoping
the domains might be similar enough for other people to comment.