FontForge

Wacom graphics tablets and FontForge

Some support was added to FontForge for the wacom graphics tablet in the early 2000s.

To install a wacom tablet on your (gnu+linux) machine you must do two things:

  • Install a kernel module “wacom.o” into your system Unfortunately the module which ships with gnu+linux (Nov 2002) does not work but John Joganic has an excellent website that will help you install a working driver.
  • Install an X11 driver “wacom_drv.o” Again the X11 driver that ships with X does not work for USB tablets. Again John’s website provides a patched driver.

If you can’t get the X11 driver to work, I have hacked a little mini-driver into FontForge (this can take the place of the X11 driver, it depends on the kernel driver working). Since the configure script can’t detect that you have a non-working X11 driver on your machine (or a tablet) you must configure this option by hand. So after the normal configure script has run (and before typing make):

$ su
# chmod 644 /dev/input/event0
# ^D
$ cd gdraw
$ vi Makefile

Add gdrawwacomdriver.lo to the list of libgdraw_OBJECTS And add -D_WACOM_DRV_BROKEN to CFLAGS.