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string2path

DEVOPS
Velocity0.0

Rendering Font into data.frame

github.com/yutannihilation/string2path ↗

A Rust-backed glyph-to-path converter swapped font engines and picked up variable fonts.

typographyrustfont-renderingdata-visualizationcran-packaging
◆Current state
string2path turns text rendered in a font into data frames of path, fill or stroke coordinates that R can plot directly. The 0.3.0 release migrated the underlying Rust stack to fontique and skrifa, which brought variable font support and let font_weight accept numeric values, at the cost of dropping WASM. The 0.3.1 patch that followed is entirely build fixes for Intel macOS and link-time optimization flags.
◆Where it's heading
Most of this package's release history is the cost of shipping Rust through CRAN — ARM Linux build errors, crate updates, deployment target mismatches on M1, installations without shared libraries, and repository policy compliance. The feature work that does land tracks font technology rather than R-side API design: partial COLRv1 color emoji in 0.2.0, variable fonts in 0.3.0. The maintainer is also candid about correcting earlier mistakes, having removed a path_id column after concluding its calculation had never been right.
◆Prediction
Expect the skrifa migration to keep paying out in font format coverage, with COLRv1 clip and layer composition the obvious gap now that a more capable backend is in place.

◆Recent moves

  1. 3mo ago

    Intel macOS and link-time optimization build fixes

    Two build fixes covering Intel macOS and the case where -flto flags reach CFLAGS, shipped eight days after 0.3.0. Routine fallout from distributing a Rust-backed package across CRAN's build matrix.

    View source ↗
  2. 4mo ago

    Font backend migrates to skrifa, unlocking variable fonts

    ⚡ SPARK

    The package changes engines: fontique and skrifa replace the previous Rust font stack, bringing variable font support and numeric font weights while dropping WASM. It closes a long-open issue and is the first release in years where the capability moved rather than the build system.

    View source ↗
  3. 1y ago

    Fill rule regression and CRAN subdirectory check

    Fixes a regression in fill rule handling and addresses a new CRAN check on compiled code in subdirectories. Maintenance in the year-long gap before the backend migration.

    View source ↗
  4. 1y ago

    Partial COLRv1 emoji support and long-standing outline fixes

    Adds partial support for COLRv1 color emoji fonts while discarding clip and layer composition data, and clears up several older errors: string2fill() and string2stroke() had been silently behaving as string2path() when passed a file path, outlines now agree across the three functions, and the path_id column was removed after the maintainer concluded its calculation had never been correct.

    View source ↗
  5. 1y ago

    Maintenance release for CRAN repository policy

    A compliance-only release with no described functional change, one of several in this package's history driven purely by CRAN requirements.

    View source ↗
  6. 2y ago

    Build error on ARM Linux fixed

    A maintenance release fixing an ARM Linux build failure. Representative of the platform-by-platform build burden that dominates this feed.

    View source ↗