[Image-SIG] Fonts that draw before the cursor

[Kris Kowal]

I made a foray with PIL a couple days ago to determine the feasibility
of generating graphics with arbitrary "Elvish" text, with a web
interface, on demand.  I used the definitive true type font to
generate a graphic of the word "ainalda", with some success.  However,
it didn't print the diacritics.

The Elvish fonts contain characters that print text before the cursor.
 In Elvish, you type out a consonant character, then you can apply
modifier glyphs to the previous character, like two dots on bottom, a
bar on top, or a hook attached to the end.  This works fine in most
applications, including web browsers.  For some reason, PIL interprets
these modifier characters as a blank space.

Does anybody out there in the blue nowhere have some ideas that might
help?  I would consider getting the C source and piddling with it, but
I'd rather not.  If I do pursue the C code, where would I start?  Are
there alternate libraries?  Could I find another tool that would
convert the font to make it work with PIL?

Graciously,
Kris Kowal.
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