How to create a .ttc font collection from individual .ttf files for PDF Export?

[Ondine Kilker]

We're trying to export our PDFs in Confluence using the following font-family: Gotham Rounded, but despite our CSS calls, Confluence defaults export to Helvetica/Arial. I have spoken to Atlassian team "support" and "bug" members and they tried this: https://confluence.atlassian.com/display/DOC/Customising+Exports+to+PDF but it was not successful. As a follow-up solution, they suggested the following:

Take the 8 font weights listed below as .ttf files and roll them into a .ttc collection. Once this .ttc collection is created, put this .ttc file into General Configuration under Confluence Administration. then choose PDF Export Language Support. 

The reason why we need a .ttc file instead of a .ttf file is that if we choose only one of the .ttf  fonts below it negates the Bold, Italic, BoldItalic, etc. upon Printout. (It works in the Wiki and Edit views however).

GothamRnd-BoldItal.ttf 

GothamRnd-Book.ttf      

GothamRnd-MedItal.ttf

GothamRnd-Bold.ttf     

GothamRnd-LightItal.ttf 

GothamRnd-Medium.ttf

GothamRnd-BookItal.ttf 

GothamRnd-Light.ttf

The issue now is that I am unable to locate a free tool to do this: Convert .ttf files into a .ttc collection.  I know that Scroll's PDF Exporter solves this export issue in general, but I would like to see if this is possible in standard Confluence before purchasing a third party plug-in. 

Thus far I have tried FontForge, TransType4 and RoboFont, but no luck. As stated here:

http://graphicdesign.stackexchange.com/questions/10535/how-to-package-all-faces-of-a-font-into-one-family-file-mac

============

You can try grouping your .TTF font files into one .TTC collection file, by opening them all at once and using File > Generate TTC... 

============

Except there is no option in the current software (FontForge) that shows the stated solution menu above: Generate TTC.

I believe this tool would work but it again is an additional purchase: http://www.fontlab.com/font-utility/dtl-otmaster/

Any help would be greatly appreciated. 

[Shannon S]

This article was created this year, but future users may find this helpful:

https://confluence.atlassian.com/display/CONFKB/How+to+create+ttc+family+font+file

Shannon Mackie

Atlassian support

[Charles Albrecht]

It seems that this approach should have worked as an extension of the sparse instructions on Advanced PDF Export Customisations. (The Medium and Light weights could be set with font-weight:500 and font-weight:300 respectively - if they're needed - and picked up when those other css classes are specified with those weights or with bolder/lighter applied to the normal weight.)

@font-face 
{ 
    font-family: GothamRnd;
    src: url(file:///usr/share/fonts/gotham-rounded/GothamRnd-Book.ttf); 
    font-weight: normal;
    font-style: normal;
    -fs-pdf-font-embed: embed;
 }
@font-face 
{ 
    font-family: GothamRnd;
    src: url(file:///usr/share/fonts/gotham-rounded/GothamRnd-Bold.ttf); 
    font-weight: bold;
    font-style: normal;
    -fs-pdf-font-embed: embed;
 }
@font-face 
{ 
    font-family: GothamRnd;
    src: url(file:///usr/share/fonts/gotham-rounded/GothamRnd-BookItal.ttf); 
    font-weight: normal;
    font-style: italic;
    -fs-pdf-font-embed: embed;
 }
@font-face 
{ 
    font-family: GothamRnd;
    src: url(file:///usr/share/fonts/gotham-rounded/GothamRnd-BoldItal.ttf); 
    font-weight: bold;
    font-style: italic;
    -fs-pdf-font-embed: embed;
 }

...and then add font-family: GothamRnd; to the styling for the desired classes (a fairly global set in the default stylesheet is: body,p,li,td,table,tr,.bodytext,.stepfield)

[Ilya Evseev]

Another way to create fonts collection: MAKETTC.EXE utility from Microsoft TrueType SDK.

Can be downloaded here: http://ftp.asia.edu.tw/Mirrors/Chinese/font/ms/english/truetype/ttsdk.zip

Works better than buggy FontForge.

[Radek Janata]

Hi Ilya,

as I'm having a problem with converting multiple TTF files into a TTC for a single font family (others are OK), I'd like to check the MAKETTC tool from MS TT SDK.

Unfortunately, your link is no longer valid and I couldn't find MAKETTC/MSTT SDK anywhere else.

Could you please post this tool on a different place? I'd like to give it a try.

Thanks!

[Ilya Evseev]

Hi Radek.

Just search "TTSDK.ZIP" in Google.

Found results:

• http://ftp.isu.edu.tw/pub/Windows/Chinese/font/ms/english/truetype/ttsdk.zip
• ftp://140.112.8.139/pub/CLE/CLE/devel/17/Chinese/font/ms/english/truetype/ttsdk.zip
• http://ftp.kaist.ac.kr/hangul/mirror/jazz.snu.ac.kr/unix/util/fonts/utils/ttsdk.zip

..and so on.

[Radek Janata]

Ilya, thanks for the links.

Unfortunately, the MAKETTC tool is an old 16-bit application unable to run on 64-bit Win systems. And currently I do not have any 32-bit system available around nor have a chance to prepare any virtual machine. I might try it later.

Thanks anyway.

[Ilya Evseev]

> Unfortunately, the MAKETTC tool is an old 16-bit application unable to run on 64-bit Win systems.

MAKETTC.EXE works very well under DOSBox

[Ilya Evseev]

At now, FontForge creates .ttc file very well.

Tested under Ubuntu 12.04 with source fonts from /usr/share/fonts/truetype/msttcorefonts/Verdana*.ttf

[Mikhail Kurskiy]

I found solution: http://fontforge.github.io/en-US/

It works on Windows 7, normaly.
To create a TTC you need open all fonts you want, and than in one opened window Generate TTC, and uncheck Mege font tables. 

[Nicolas Casel]

Thanks a lot @Mikhail Kurskiy , this fontforge software works well and I've succeeded in creating a .ttc file

[Mikhail Kurskiy]

You are welcome :)

[Mikhail Kurskiy]

@Ondine Kilker, hello!

Have you find a solution?
I have the same problem.