Glyph Interchange Format

File Format

XML

The Glyph Interchange Format (GLIF) is a simple and clear XML representation of a single glyph. GLIF files typically have a .glif extension.

Specification

<glyph> The top level element.

Attributes

name	description
name	The name of the glyph
format	The format version. 1 for this version.

The name attribute has limited uses in this version. The contents.plist file maps glyph names to file names, and one of the reasons to do this is to avoid having to parse all files just to get at a list of available glyph names. When reading GLIF files, the name attribute is probably best ignored, since manual editing may have caused a mismatch with the glyph name as stored in contents.plist, as well as with the file name, which is an algorithmic transformation of the glyph name. This attribute may become more useful in future versions of GLIF.

Child Elements

name	description
advance	May occur at most once.
unicode	May occur any number of times.
outline	May occur at most once.
lib	May occur at most once.

<advance> Horizontal and vertical metrics.

Attributes

name	type	description
width	integer or float	The advance width.
height	integer or float	The vertical advance.

This element has no child elements.

<unicode> Unicode code point.

Attributes

name	description
hex	A unicode code point as a hexadecimal number.

This element has no child elements. The first occurrence of this element defines the primary unicode value for this glyph.

<outline> Outline description.

Child Elements

name	description
component	May occur any number of times.
contour	May occur any number of times.

This element has no attributes.

<component> Insert another glyph as part of the outline.

Attributes

name	type	description	default
base	string	Name of the base glyph	None
xScale	integer or float	See below.	1
xyScale	integer or float	See below.	0
yxScale	integer or float	See below.	0
yScale	integer or float	See below.	1
xOffset	integer or float	See below.	0
yOffset	integer or float	See below.	0

xScale, xyScale, yxScale, yScale, xOffset, yOffset taken together in that order form an Affine transformation matrix, to be used to transform the base glyph. The default matrix is [1 0 0 1 0 0], the identity transformation.

This element has no child elements.

<contour> Contour description.

Child Elements

name	description
point	May occur any number of times.

This element has no attributes.

<point> An attributed coordinate pair.

Attributes

name	type	description	default
x	integer or float	The ‘x’ coordinate.	None
y	integer or float	The ‘y’ coordinate.	None
type	string	The point and/or segment type. The options are detailed below.	offcurve
smooth	string	This attribute can only be given when type indicates the point is on-curve. When set to yes, it signifies that a smooth curvature should be maintained at this point, either as a curve point or a tangent point in Fontographer terms.	no
name	string	Arbitrary name or label for this point. The name does not have to be unique within a contour, nor within an outline.	None

This element has no child elements.

Point Types

move	A point of this type MUST be the first in a contour. The reverse is not true: a contour does not necessarily start with a move point. When a contour does start with a move point, it signifies the beginning of an open contour. A closed contour does not start with a move and is defined as a cyclic list of points, with no predominant start point. There is always a next point and a previous point. For this purpose the list of points can be seen as endless in both directions. The actual list of points can be rotated arbitrarily (by removing the first N points and appending them at the end) while still describing the same outline.
line	Draw a straight line from the previous point to this point. The previous point may be a move, a line, a curve or a qcurve, but not an offcurve.
offcurve	This point is part of a curve segment, that goes up to the next point that is either a curve or a qcurve.
curve	Draw a cubic bezier curve from the last non-offcurve point to this point. If the number of offcurve points is zero, a straight line is drawn. If it is one, a quadratic curve is drawn. If it is two, a regular cubic bezier is drawn. If it is larger than 2, a series of cubic bezier segments are drawn, as defined by the Super Bezier algorithm.
qcurve	Similar to curve, but uses quadratic curves, using the TrueType “implied on-curve points” principle.

<lib> Custom data storage.

This element is structure is defined as a XML Property List. This element may occur at most once. lib has exactly one child, which must be dict. To avoid naming conflicts, keys should use the Reverse Domain Naming Convention defined for lib.plist.

Example

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<glyph name="period" format="1">
  <advance width="268"/>
  <unicode hex="002E"/>
  <outline>
    <contour>
      <point x="237" y="152"/>
      <point x="193" y="187"/>
      <point x="134" y="187" type="curve" smooth="yes"/>
      <point x="74" y="187"/>
      <point x="30" y="150"/>
      <point x="30" y="88" type="curve" smooth="yes"/>
      <point x="30" y="23"/>
      <point x="74" y="-10"/>
      <point x="134" y="-10" type="curve" smooth="yes"/>
      <point x="193" y="-10"/>
      <point x="237" y="25"/>
      <point x="237" y="88" type="curve" smooth="yes"/>
    </contour>
  </outline>
  <lib>
    <dict>
      <key>com.letterror.somestuff</key>
      <string>arbitrary custom data!</string>
    </dict>
  </lib>
</glyph>