Guide for designing glyphs in the modern-style Sung or Hei typefaces for the Hong Kong market.

There are two main reference documents for character glyphs in Hong Kong.

• 香港小學學習字詞表
  This is produced by the Education Bureau and distributed to primary and secondary schools.
  The glyphs provided are in the Kai typeface.
  See: https://www.edbchinese.hk/lexlist_ch/

• Reference Glyphs for Chinese Computer Systems in Hong Kong
  This is published by the Office of the Government Chief Information Officer.
  The glyphs provided are in the Kai typeface and Song typeface.
  See: https://www.ccli.gov.hk/en/download/reference_glyphs.html

These documents are prepared by the respective government agencies as a reference only. They differ in various aspects to commerically produced fonts.

As noted on the page for the reference glyphs produced by OGCIO:

Please note that it is not the intention of the document to set standards for characters commonly used in Hong Kong, or to impose any restrictions on the styles adopted by font developers.

Commerical fonts are widely used in advertising and publishing. Government brochures and promotional materials use off-the-shelf commerical fonts which contain glyphs which differ from the reference materials. Commerical fonts are also widely used in newspapers. Commerical fonts are also often used in textbooks. Not a lot of textbooks actually use the "standards compliant" fonts. The forms found in commerical fonts are actually the forms that most people are familiar with, not the reference glyphs provided by the government.

When designing fonts for the Hong Kong market or greater Traditional Chinese market, font developers need to use their own judgement to design the glyphs to use appropriate forms.

This repository aims to provide a general guide for producing fonts which are most suited to the Hong Kong market. This document is written in reference to the norms of Simplified Chinese font production.

There are two main styles of glyphs which are used in commerical fonts, the traditional-style and modern-style. The most popular commerical fonts used in Hong Kong are in modern-style.

Even though they are modern-style fonts, the bulk of these fonts use the traditional split-stroke hook and the split-stroke corner stroke instead of the joined hook and joined corner stroke commonly seen in GB-compliant fonts produced for mainland China.

Always use the traditional split-stroke hook and split-stroke corner. It is widely accepted and superior in terms of aesthetics and legibility.

In the reference guides, the avoidance of strokes (避讓) is applied extremely broadly. Characters on the top with a 捺 stroke needs to be changed to a 點 stroke even if the character on the bottom does not have a 捺 stroke, e.g. 香 has a 點 stroke instead of a 捺 stroke. The reverse is also true, e.g. the 矢 in 挨 has a 點 stroke instead of 捺 stroke. For some cases like 央, the 捺 stroke is even changed when it is on the right.

Commerically produced fonts do not follow these avoidance of strokes. They may either follow the GB-compliant forms where the 捺 stroke is changed only in cases to ensure that only one 捺 stroke is present in each character, or keep 捺 strokes as they are.

Either are fine. Do not apply the avoidance of strokes simply because the character is on the top or bottom.

Avoid the stroke when the character is on the left e.g. the 文 inside 斑. Exception: the 捺 of 瓜 in 瓣 is usually kept unchanged in commercial fonts.

Avoid the stroke when the character is inside a enclosure component may sometimes not be applied especially in extra bold fonts, e.g. 各 inside 閣.

Most Sung typefaces produced for the Traditional Chinese market prefer narrower 中宮 than mainstream typefaces produced for the Simplified Chinese market. It is nearly obviously recognizable which fonts are produced for the Simplified Chinese market and which fonts are produced for the Traditional Chinese market instantly based on the 中宮.

Most Hei typefaces also use thicker strokes compared to those for the Simplified Chinese market for more complex characters, leading to a visually more consistent vertical stroke length but higher variability in overall "grayness". Do not over thin the vertical strokes for better "grayness". There is supposed to be a contrast between characters with a few strokes and characters with a lot of strokes.

Some characters use different components and/or structure compared to the GB-compliant forms. A small subset of high frequency characters have different components / structure according to the reference guides, but the GB-compliant forms are actually the most common and widely accepted, e.g. 七, 也, 感. Refer to the respective .md files for more details.