Embedding of "built-in" fonts about asciidoctor-pdf HOT 2 CLOSED

Thanks for the feedback. The key point, unknown to me, is that Helvetica is not a free font.

from asciidoctor-pdf.

No, they should not. AFM fonts are assumed to be provided by the PDF reader. For all intents and purposes, they are default, application-provided fonts.

9.6.2.2 Standard Type 1 Fonts (Standard 14 Fonts)

The PostScript names of 14 Type 1 fonts, known as the standard 14 fonts, are as follows: Times-Roman,
Helvetica, Courier, Symbol, Times-Bold, Helvetica-Bold, Courier-Bold, ZapfDingbats, Times-Italic, Helvetica-
Oblique, Courier-Oblique, Times-BoldItalic, Helvetica-BoldOblique, Courier-BoldOblique

These fonts, or their font metrics and suitable substitution fonts, shall be available to the conforming reader.

If you want a font to be embedded, it has to be a TTF font. That is the specification to which Prawn is developed and is unlikely to change. You're welcome to create a theme that defines Helvetica as a TTF font in the font catalog, in which case it will be used and bundled.

Helvetica is also not a free font. So even if we wanted to automatically translate an AFM font to a bundled TTF font, we wouldn't be able to in an open source project.

The documentation already strongly recommends avoiding the use of the AFM fonts. They are supported since they are defined as part of the PDF specification, but even the specification acknowledges that they have severe drawbacks.

from asciidoctor-pdf.