How to make the Em dash character in notes, parameters

An Em dash is a dash the width of the Em quad. If it sounded like this was going to be a "How to" tutorial, I apologize. I don't know how and some military supply, logistics or provisioning database (NSN?, not sure) says I need to separate fields with this character in drawing titles. The solution would have to be applicable to parameters, as well, since that's where the text is established.

If Pro/e were a Windows program, this would be simple. I'd just type Alt-0151 and the Em dash would appear in the text. Try this in Pro/e and you'll get an "Illegal character" error message which also says the character was replaced with a "?"

Much of the problem is that Pro/e has its own proprietary fonting system, comprised of a font.ndx file which lists a bunch of font files that the default_font option lists. The fonts referenced in that .ndx file are compiled from ascii.src, special.src, latin.src ~ a set of editable source file contained in the <loadpoint>\text\usascii directory. Actually, both the .NDX and .SRC files are stored there. I'm not a hundred percent sure what the .src files are but it looks like they combine font mapping with drawing commands, fonts strokes, a kind of hint map.

This is outlined in the "Installation and Administraton Guide" (Pro/e 'Help>Help Center', 'Other modules' under Functional Area and '-Installation Guide' under Modules and Books, pp.162-170). I tried editing the ascii, latin and special fonts, to no effect. Compiling of the edited .src file is done with compile_font and decompile_font stored in the <loadpoint>\i486_nt\obj directory. (decompile_font gets you a source file).

Anyone successfully added a character to a font? At this point, any experience is worth sharing! Anyone know, short of modifying a font, how to place an Em dash in notes or parameters?

David Janes

 

An Em dash is a dash the width of the Em quad. If it sounded like this was going to be a "How to" tutorial, I apologize. I don't know how and some military supply, logistics or provisioning database (NSN?, not sure) says I need to separate fields with this character in drawing titles. The solution would have to be applicable to parameters, as well, since that's where the text is established.

If Pro/e were a Windows program, this would be simple. I'd just type Alt-0151 and the Em dash would appear in the text. Try this in Pro/e and you'll get an "Illegal character" error message which also says the character was replaced with a "?"

Much of the problem is that Pro/e has its own proprietary fonting system, comprised of a font.ndx file which lists a bunch of font files that the default_font option lists. The fonts referenced in that .ndx file are compiled from ascii.src, special.src, latin.src ~ a set of editable source file contained in the <loadpoint>\text\usascii directory. Actually, both the .NDX and .SRC files are stored there. I'm not a hundred percent sure what the .src files are but it looks like they combine font mapping with drawing commands, fonts strokes, a kind of hint map.

This is outlined in the "Installation and Administraton Guide" (Pro/e 'Help>Help Center', 'Other modules' under Functional Area and '-Installation Guide' under Modules and Books, pp.162-170). I tried editing the ascii, latin and special fonts, to no effect. Compiling of the edited .src file is done with compile_font and decompile_font stored in the <loadpoint>\i486_nt\obj directory. (decompile_font gets you a source file).

Anyone successfully added a character to a font? At this point, any experience is worth sharing! Anyone know, short of modifying a font, how to place an Em dash in notes or parameters?

David Janes


I have a brief update on this, possible victory: it seems that the Special font (Special.src/Special.fnt [compiled vers]) is the basis for the 35-character Text Symbols palette. These characters are available from the keyboard by typing ^A{keyboard character}^B. One of the keyboard characters is not represented in the palette, the Dash character. But, interestingly enough, ^A-^B makes something akin to the Em Dash. Editing the Special.src file to make the character space wider (35) and the drawing command to almost fill the space. So, this is the actual source file entry:
"-"

width 35

m 3, 20

d 32,20

These appear to approximate x/y coordinates and relative vectors. Compiled with compile_font, this produces a pretty fair rep of an Em Dash. Not too long, not too short, just right!!

David Janes