[Fontconfig] Difficulty finding a font file through the libraries

[Lawrence D'Oliveiro]

On Sun, 7 Nov 2021 16:46:42 -0600, Michael Brennen wrote:

> I don’t know what the variable false or true means in a font.

It indicates that it is a variable font -- one with font variations,
either Adobe Multiple Masters or TrueType GX variations. Note that
Ghostscript is explicitly setting FC_VARIABLE to false in the pattern
it uses to find matching fonts.

> The file BAHNSCHRIFT.TTF in that archive has the same md5 sum as the
> bahnschrift.ttf file on the server I am working on. Within some
> miniscule margin of error, they are the same. :)

That sounds good enough for me.

I just copied BAHNSCHRIFT.TTF into my ~/.local/share/fonts, and ran a
quick Python script to enumerate available fonts, trying to emulate the
Fontconfig calls that Ghostscript is making as closely as possible. In
among all the lines of output, there are 5 Bahnschrift entries, all
with sensible-looking properties, including weights in the range 50 to
200.

Further thought: how old is CentOS 7? I have come across bugs in
Fontconfig before, and then been told it was due to having outdated
versions in my Debian installation. (I think Debian Unstable is
reasonably up-to-date right now...)