# wxFont Class Reference
[Graphics Device Interface (GDI)]

`#include </home/work/projects/wx/2.9/wx/interface/wx/font.h>`

Inheritance diagram for wxFont:
[legend]

## Detailed Description

A font is an object which determines the appearance of text.

Fonts are used for drawing text to a device context, and setting the appearance of a window's text.

This class uses reference counting and copy-on-write internally so that assignments between two instances of this class are very cheap. You can therefore use actual objects instead of pointers without efficiency problems. If an instance of this class is changed it will create its own data internally so that other instances, which previously shared the data using the reference counting, are not affected.

You can retrieve the current system font settings with wxSystemSettings.

##

Library: wxCore
Category: Graphics Device Interface (GDI)

Predefined objects/pointers: wxNullFont, wxNORMAL_FONT, wxSMALL_FONT, wxITALIC_FONT, wxSWISS_FONT

See also:
  wxFont Overview, wxDC::SetFont, wxDC::DrawText, wxDC::GetTextExtent, wxFontDialog, wxSystemSettings

## Public Member Functions

| wxFont ()
| Default ctor.
| wxFont (const wxFont &font)
| Copy constructor, uses reference counting.
| wxFont (int pointSize, wxFontFamily family, wxFontStyle style, wxFontWeight weight, bool underline=false, const wxString &faceName=wxEmptyString, wxFontEncoding encoding=wxFONTENCODING_DEFAULT)
| Creates a font object with the specified attributes.
| wxFont (const wxSize &pixelSize, wxFontFamily family, wxFontStyle style, wxFontWeight weight, bool underline=false, const wxString &faceName=wxEmptyString, wxFontEncoding encoding=wxFONTENCODING_DEFAULT)
| Creates a font object with the specified attributes.
| wxFont (const wxString &fontdesc)
| Constructor from font description string.
virtual | ~wxFont ()
| Destructor.
bool | operator!= (const wxFont &font) const
| Inequality operator.
bool | operator== (const wxFont &font) const
| Equality operator.
wxFont & | operator= (const wxFont &font)
| Assignment operator, using reference counting.
Getters
virtual wxFontEncoding | GetEncoding () const
| Returns the encoding of this font.
virtual wxString | GetFaceName () const
| Returns the face name associated with the font, or the empty string if there is no face information.
virtual wxFontFamily | GetFamily () const
| Gets the font family if possible.
wxString | GetNativeFontInfoDesc () const
| Returns the platform-dependent string completely describing this font.
wxString | GetNativeFontInfoUserDesc () const
| Returns a user-friendly string for this font object.
virtual int | GetPointSize () const
| Gets the point size.
virtual wxSize | GetPixelSize () const
| Gets the pixel size.
virtual wxFontStyle | GetStyle () const
| Gets the font style.
virtual bool | GetUnderlined () const
| Returns true if the font is underlined, false otherwise.
virtual wxFontWeight | GetWeight () const
| Gets the font weight.
virtual bool | IsFixedWidth () const
| Returns true if the font is a fixed width (or monospaced) font, false if it is a proportional one or font is invalid.
virtual bool | IsOk () const
| Returns true if this object is a valid font, false otherwise.
Similar fonts creation
The functions in this section either modify the font in place or create a new font similar to the given one but with its weight, style or size changed.
wxFont | Bold () const
| Returns a bold version of this font.
wxFont | Italic () const
| Returns an italic version of this font.
wxFont | Larger () const
| Returns a larger version of this font.
wxFont | Smaller () const
| Returns a smaller version of this font.
wxFont | Underlined () const
| Returns underlined version of this font.
wxFont & | MakeBold ()
| Changes this font to be bold.
wxFont & | MakeItalic ()
| Changes this font to be italic.
wxFont & | MakeLarger ()
| Changes this font to be larger.
wxFont & | MakeSmaller ()
| Changes this font to be smaller.
wxFont & | MakeUnderlined ()
| Changes this font to be underlined.
wxFont & | Scale (float x)
| Changes the size of this font.
wxFont | Scaled (float x) const
| Returns a scaled version of this font.
Setters
These functions internally recreate the native font object with the new specified property.
virtual void | SetEncoding (wxFontEncoding encoding)
| Sets the encoding for this font.
virtual bool | SetFaceName (const wxString &faceName)
| Sets the facename for the font.
virtual void | SetFamily (wxFontFamily family)
| Sets the font family.
bool | SetNativeFontInfo (const wxString &info)
| Creates the font corresponding to the given native font description string which must have been previously returned by GetNativeFontInfoDesc().
bool | SetNativeFontInfoUserDesc (const wxString &info)
| Creates the font corresponding to the given native font description string and returns true if the creation was successful.
virtual void | SetPointSize (int pointSize)
| Sets the point size.
virtual void | SetPixelSize (const wxSize &pixelSize)
| Sets the pixel size.
virtual void | SetStyle (wxFontStyle style)
| Sets the font style.
void | SetSymbolicSize (wxFontSymbolicSize size)
| Sets the font size using a predefined symbolic size name.
void | SetSymbolicSizeRelativeTo (wxFontSymbolicSize size, int base)
| Sets the font size compared to the base font size.
virtual void | SetUnderlined (bool underlined)
| Sets underlining.
virtual void | SetWeight (wxFontWeight weight)
| Sets the font weight.

## Static Public Member Functions

static wxFontEncoding | GetDefaultEncoding ()
| Returns the current application's default encoding.
static void | SetDefaultEncoding (wxFontEncoding encoding)
| Sets the default font encoding.
static wxFont * | New (int pointSize, wxFontFamily family, wxFontStyle style, wxFontWeight weight, bool underline=false, const wxString &faceName=wxEmptyString, wxFontEncoding encoding=wxFONTENCODING_DEFAULT)
| This function takes the same parameters as the relative wxFont constructor and returns a new font object allocated on the heap.
static wxFont * | New (int pointSize, wxFontFamily family, int flags=wxFONTFLAG_DEFAULT, const wxString &faceName=wxEmptyString, wxFontEncoding encoding=wxFONTENCODING_DEFAULT)
| This function takes the same parameters as the relative wxFont constructor and returns a new font object allocated on the heap.
static wxFont * | New (const wxSize &pixelSize, wxFontFamily family, wxFontStyle style, wxFontWeight weight, bool underline=false, const wxString &faceName=wxEmptyString, wxFontEncoding encoding=wxFONTENCODING_DEFAULT)
| This function takes the same parameters as the relative wxFont constructor and returns a new font object allocated on the heap.
static wxFont * | New (const wxSize &pixelSize, wxFontFamily family, int flags=wxFONTFLAG_DEFAULT, const wxString &faceName=wxEmptyString, wxFontEncoding encoding=wxFONTENCODING_DEFAULT)
| This function takes the same parameters as the relative wxFont constructor and returns a new font object allocated on the heap.

List of all members.

## Constructor & Destructor Documentation

wxFont::wxFont | ( |  | ) |

Default ctor.

wxFont::wxFont | ( | const wxFont & | font | ) |

Copy constructor, uses reference counting.

wxFont::wxFont | ( | int | pointSize,
|  | wxFontFamily | family,
|  | wxFontStyle | style,
|  | wxFontWeight | weight,
|  | bool | underline = `false`,
|  | const wxString & | faceName = `wxEmptyString`,
|  | wxFontEncoding | encoding = `wxFONTENCODING_DEFAULT` |
| ) |  |  |

Creates a font object with the specified attributes.

Parameters:

  | pointSize | Size in points. See SetPointSize() for more info.
  | family | The font family: a generic portable way of referring to fonts without specifying a facename. This parameter must be one of the wxFontFamily enumeration values. If the faceName argument is provided, then it overrides the font family.
  | style | One of `wxFONTSTYLE_NORMAL`, `wxFONTSTYLE_SLANT` and `wxFONTSTYLE_ITALIC`.
  | weight | Font weight, sometimes also referred to as font boldness. One of the wxFontWeight enumeration values.
  | underline | The value can be true or false. At present this has an effect on Windows and Motif 2.x only.
  | faceName | An optional string specifying the face name to be used. If it is an empty string, a default face name will be chosen based on the family.

  encoding

  An encoding which may be one of the enumeration values of wxFontEncoding. Briefly these can be summed up as:

  `wxFONTENCODING_SYSTEM` | Default system encoding.
  `wxFONTENCODING_DEFAULT` | Default application encoding: this is the encoding set by calls to SetDefaultEncoding() and which may be set to, say, KOI8 to create all fonts by default with KOI8 encoding. Initially, the default application encoding is the same as default system encoding.
  `wxFONTENCODING_ISO8859_1`...15 | ISO8859 encodings.
  `wxFONTENCODING_KOI8` | The standard Russian encoding for Internet.
  `wxFONTENCODING_CP1250`...1252 | Windows encodings similar to ISO8859 (but not identical).

  If the specified encoding isn't available, no font is created (see also Font Encodings).

Remarks:
  If the desired font does not exist, the closest match will be chosen. Under Windows, only scalable TrueType fonts are used.

wxFont::wxFont | ( | const wxSize & | pixelSize,
|  | wxFontFamily | family,
|  | wxFontStyle | style,
|  | wxFontWeight | weight,
|  | bool | underline = `false`,
|  | const wxString & | faceName = `wxEmptyString`,
|  | wxFontEncoding | encoding = `wxFONTENCODING_DEFAULT` |
| ) |  |  |

Creates a font object with the specified attributes.

Parameters:

  | pixelSize | Size in pixels. See SetPixelSize() for more info.
  | family | The font family: a generic portable way of referring to fonts without specifying a facename. This parameter must be one of the wxFontFamily enumeration values. If the faceName argument is provided, then it overrides the font family.
  | style | One of `wxFONTSTYLE_NORMAL`, `wxFONTSTYLE_SLANT` and `wxFONTSTYLE_ITALIC`.
  | weight | Font weight, sometimes also referred to as font boldness. One of the wxFontWeight enumeration values.
  | underline | The value can be true or false. At present this has an effect on Windows and Motif 2.x only.
  | faceName | An optional string specifying the face name to be used. If it is an empty string, a default face name will be chosen based on the family.

  encoding

  An encoding which may be one of the enumeration values of wxFontEncoding. Briefly these can be summed up as:

  `wxFONTENCODING_SYSTEM` | Default system encoding.
  `wxFONTENCODING_DEFAULT` | Default application encoding: this is the encoding set by calls to SetDefaultEncoding() and which may be set to, say, KOI8 to create all fonts by default with KOI8 encoding. Initially, the default application encoding is the same as default system encoding.
  `wxFONTENCODING_ISO8859_1`...15 | ISO8859 encodings.
  `wxFONTENCODING_KOI8` | The standard Russian encoding for Internet.
  `wxFONTENCODING_CP1250`...1252 | Windows encodings similar to ISO8859 (but not identical).

  If the specified encoding isn't available, no font is created (see also Font Encodings).

Remarks:
  If the desired font does not exist, the closest match will be chosen. Under Windows, only scalable TrueType fonts are used.

wxFont::wxFont | ( | const wxString & | fontdesc | ) |

Constructor from font description string.

This constructor uses SetNativeFontInfo() to initialize the font. If fontdesc is invalid the font remains uninitialized, i.e. its IsOk() method will return false.

virtual wxFont::~wxFont | ( |  | ) | `[virtual]`

Destructor.

See reference-counted object destruction for more info.

Remarks:
  Although all remaining fonts are deleted when the application exits, the application should try to clean up all fonts itself. This is because wxWidgets cannot know if a pointer to the font object is stored in an application data structure, and there is a risk of double deletion.

## Member Function Documentation

wxFont wxFont::Bold | ( |  | ) | const

Returns a bold version of this font.

See also:
  MakeBold()

Since:
  2.9.1

static wxFontEncoding wxFont::GetDefaultEncoding | ( |  | ) | `[static]`

Returns the current application's default encoding.

See also:
  Font Encodings, SetDefaultEncoding()

virtual wxFontEncoding wxFont::GetEncoding | ( |  | ) | const`[virtual]`

Returns the encoding of this font.

Note that under wxGTK the returned value is always `wxFONTENCODING_UTF8`.

See also:
  SetEncoding()

virtual wxString wxFont::GetFaceName | ( |  | ) | const`[virtual]`

Returns the face name associated with the font, or the empty string if there is no face information.

See also:
  SetFaceName()

virtual wxFontFamily wxFont::GetFamily | ( |  | ) | const`[virtual]`

Gets the font family if possible.

As described in wxFontFamily docs the returned value acts as a rough, basic classification of the main font properties (look, spacing).

If the current font face name is not recognized by wxFont or by the underlying system, `wxFONTFAMILY_DEFAULT` is returned.

Note that currently this function is not very precise and so not particularly useful. Font families mostly make sense only for font creation, see SetFamily().

See also:
  SetFamily()

wxString wxFont::GetNativeFontInfoDesc | ( |  | ) | const

Returns the platform-dependent string completely describing this font.

Returned string is always non-empty unless the font is invalid (in which case an assert is triggered).

Note that the returned string is not meant to be shown or edited by the user: a typical use of this function is for serializing in string-form a wxFont object.

See also:
  SetNativeFontInfo(), GetNativeFontInfoUserDesc()

wxString wxFont::GetNativeFontInfoUserDesc | ( |  | ) | const

Returns a user-friendly string for this font object.

Returned string is always non-empty unless the font is invalid (in which case an assert is triggered).

The string does not encode all wxFont infos under all platforms; e.g. under wxMSW the font family is not present in the returned string.

Some examples of the formats of returned strings (which are platform-dependent) are in SetNativeFontInfoUserDesc().

See also:
  SetNativeFontInfoUserDesc(), GetNativeFontInfoDesc()

virtual wxSize wxFont::GetPixelSize | ( |  | ) | const`[virtual]`

Gets the pixel size.

Note that under wxMSW if you passed to SetPixelSize() (or to the ctor) a wxSize object with a null width value, you'll get a null width in the returned object.

See also:
  SetPixelSize()

virtual int wxFont::GetPointSize | ( |  | ) | const`[virtual]`

Gets the point size.

See also:
  SetPointSize()

virtual wxFontStyle wxFont::GetStyle | ( |  | ) | const`[virtual]`

Gets the font style.

See wxFontStyle for a list of valid styles.

See also:
  SetStyle()

virtual bool wxFont::GetUnderlined | ( |  | ) | const`[virtual]`

Returns true if the font is underlined, false otherwise.

See also:
  SetUnderlined()

virtual wxFontWeight wxFont::GetWeight | ( |  | ) | const`[virtual]`

Gets the font weight.

See wxFontWeight for a list of valid weight identifiers.

See also:
  SetWeight()

virtual bool wxFont::IsFixedWidth | ( |  | ) | const`[virtual]`

Returns true if the font is a fixed width (or monospaced) font, false if it is a proportional one or font is invalid.

Note that this function under some platforms is different than just testing for the font family being equal to `wxFONTFAMILY_TELETYPE` because native platform-specific functions are used for the check (resulting in a more accurate return value).

virtual bool wxFont::IsOk | ( |  | ) | const`[virtual]`

Returns true if this object is a valid font, false otherwise.

wxFont wxFont::Italic | ( |  | ) | const

Returns an italic version of this font.

See also:
  MakeItalic()

Since:
  2.9.1

wxFont wxFont::Larger | ( |  | ) | const

Returns a larger version of this font.

The font size is multiplied by `1.2`, the factor of `1.2` being inspired by the W3C CSS specification.

See also:
  MakeLarger(), Smaller(), Scaled()

Since:
  2.9.1

wxFont& wxFont::MakeBold | ( |  | ) |

Changes this font to be bold.

See also:
  Bold()

Since:
  2.9.1

wxFont& wxFont::MakeItalic | ( |  | ) |

Changes this font to be italic.

See also:
  Italic()

Since:
  2.9.1

wxFont& wxFont::MakeLarger | ( |  | ) |

Changes this font to be larger.

The font size is multiplied by `1.2`, the factor of `1.2` being inspired by the W3C CSS specification.

See also:
  Larger(), MakeSmaller(), Scale()

Since:
  2.9.1

wxFont& wxFont::MakeSmaller | ( |  | ) |

Changes this font to be smaller.

The font size is divided by `1.2`, the factor of `1.2` being inspired by the W3C CSS specification.

See also:
  Smaller(), MakeLarger(), Scale()

Since:
  2.9.1

wxFont& wxFont::MakeUnderlined | ( |  | ) |

Changes this font to be underlined.

See also:
  Underlined()

Since:
  2.9.2

static wxFont* wxFont::New | ( | int | pointSize,
|  | wxFontFamily | family,
|  | int | flags = `wxFONTFLAG_DEFAULT`,
|  | const wxString & | faceName = `wxEmptyString`,
|  | wxFontEncoding | encoding = `wxFONTENCODING_DEFAULT` |
| ) |  |  | `[static]`

This function takes the same parameters as the relative wxFont constructor and returns a new font object allocated on the heap.

static wxFont* wxFont::New | ( | const wxSize & | pixelSize,
|  | wxFontFamily | family,
|  | int | flags = `wxFONTFLAG_DEFAULT`,
|  | const wxString & | faceName = `wxEmptyString`,
|  | wxFontEncoding | encoding = `wxFONTENCODING_DEFAULT` |
| ) |  |  | `[static]`

This function takes the same parameters as the relative wxFont constructor and returns a new font object allocated on the heap.

static wxFont* wxFont::New | ( | const wxSize & | pixelSize,
|  | wxFontFamily | family,
|  | wxFontStyle | style,
|  | wxFontWeight | weight,
|  | bool | underline = `false`,
|  | const wxString & | faceName = `wxEmptyString`,
|  | wxFontEncoding | encoding = `wxFONTENCODING_DEFAULT` |
| ) |  |  | `[static]`

This function takes the same parameters as the relative wxFont constructor and returns a new font object allocated on the heap.

static wxFont* wxFont::New | ( | int | pointSize,
|  | wxFontFamily | family,
|  | wxFontStyle | style,
|  | wxFontWeight | weight,
|  | bool | underline = `false`,
|  | const wxString & | faceName = `wxEmptyString`,
|  | wxFontEncoding | encoding = `wxFONTENCODING_DEFAULT` |
| ) |  |  | `[static]`

This function takes the same parameters as the relative wxFont constructor and returns a new font object allocated on the heap.

bool wxFont::operator!= | ( | const wxFont & | font | ) | const

Inequality operator.

See reference-counted object comparison for more info.

wxFont& wxFont::operator= | ( | const wxFont & | font | ) |

Assignment operator, using reference counting.

bool wxFont::operator== | ( | const wxFont & | font | ) | const

Equality operator.

See reference-counted object comparison for more info.

wxFont& wxFont::Scale | ( | float | x | ) |

Changes the size of this font.

The font size is multiplied by the given factor (which may be less than 1 to create a smaller version of the font).

See also:
  Scaled(), MakeLarger(), MakeSmaller()

Since:
  2.9.1

wxFont wxFont::Scaled | ( | float | x | ) | const

Returns a scaled version of this font.

The font size is multiplied by the given factor (which may be less than 1 to create a smaller version of the font).

See also:
  Scale(), Larger(), Smaller()

Since:
  2.9.1

static void wxFont::SetDefaultEncoding | ( | wxFontEncoding | encoding | ) | `[static]`

Sets the default font encoding.

See also:
  Font Encodings, GetDefaultEncoding()

virtual void wxFont::SetEncoding | ( | wxFontEncoding | encoding | ) | `[virtual]`

Sets the encoding for this font.

Note that under wxGTK this function has no effect (because the underlying Pango library always uses `wxFONTENCODING_UTF8`).

See also:
  GetEncoding()

virtual bool wxFont::SetFaceName | ( | const wxString & | faceName | ) | `[virtual]`

Sets the facename for the font.

Parameters:

  | faceName | A valid facename, which should be on the end-user's system.

Remarks:
  To avoid portability problems, don't rely on a specific face, but specify the font family instead (see wxFontFamily and SetFamily()).

Returns:
  true if the given face name exists; if the face name doesn't exist in the user's system then the font is invalidated (so that IsOk() will return false) and false is returned.

See also:
  GetFaceName(), SetFamily()

virtual void wxFont::SetFamily | ( | wxFontFamily | family | ) | `[virtual]`

Sets the font family.

As described in wxFontFamily docs the given family value acts as a rough, basic indication of the main font properties (look, spacing).

Note that changing the font family results in changing the font face name.

Parameters:

  | family | One of the wxFontFamily values.

See also:
  GetFamily(), SetFaceName()

bool wxFont::SetNativeFontInfo | ( | const wxString & | info | ) |

Creates the font corresponding to the given native font description string which must have been previously returned by GetNativeFontInfoDesc().

If the string is invalid, font is unchanged. This function is typically used for de-serializing a wxFont object previously saved in a string-form.

Returns:
  true if the creation was successful.

See also:
  SetNativeFontInfoUserDesc()

bool wxFont::SetNativeFontInfoUserDesc | ( | const wxString & | info | ) |

Creates the font corresponding to the given native font description string and returns true if the creation was successful.

Unlike SetNativeFontInfo(), this function accepts strings which are user-friendly. Examples of accepted string formats are:

platform | generic syntax | example
--- | --- | ---
wxGTK2 | `[FACE-NAME] [bold] [oblique|italic] [POINTSIZE]` | Monospace bold 10
wxMSW | `[light|bold] [italic] [FACE-NAME] [POINTSIZE] [ENCODING]` | Tahoma 10 WINDOWS-1252

Todo:
  add an example for wxMac

For more detailed information about the allowed syntaxes you can look at the documentation of the native API used for font-rendering (e.g. `pango_font_description_from_string` on GTK).

Note that unlike SetNativeFontInfo(), this function doesn't always restore all attributes of the wxFont object under all platforms; e.g. on wxMSW the font family is not restored (because GetNativeFontInfoUserDesc doesn't return it on wxMSW). If you want to serialize/deserialize a font in string form, you should use GetNativeFontInfoDesc() and SetNativeFontInfo() instead.

See also:
  SetNativeFontInfo()

virtual void wxFont::SetPixelSize | ( | const wxSize & | pixelSize | ) | `[virtual]`

Sets the pixel size.

The height parameter of pixelSize must be positive while the width parameter may also be zero (to indicate that you're not interested in the width of the characters: a suitable width will be chosen for best rendering).

This feature (specifying the font pixel size) is directly supported only under wxMSW and wxGTK currently; under other platforms a font with the closest size to the given one is found using binary search (this maybe slower).

See also:
  GetPixelSize()

virtual void wxFont::SetPointSize | ( | int | pointSize | ) | `[virtual]`

Sets the point size.

The point size is defined as 1/72 of the anglo-Saxon inch (25.4 mm): it is approximately 0.0139 inch or 352.8 um.

Parameters:

  | pointSize | Size in points.

See also:
  GetPointSize()

virtual void wxFont::SetStyle | ( | wxFontStyle | style | ) | `[virtual]`

Sets the font style.

Parameters:

  | style | One of the wxFontStyle enumeration values.

See also:
  GetStyle()

void wxFont::SetSymbolicSize | ( | wxFontSymbolicSize | size | ) |

Sets the font size using a predefined symbolic size name.

This function allows to change font size to be (very) large or small compared to the standard font size.

See also:
  SetSymbolicSizeRelativeTo().

Since:
  2.9.2

void wxFont::SetSymbolicSizeRelativeTo | ( | wxFontSymbolicSize | size,
|  | int | base |
| ) |  |  |

Sets the font size compared to the base font size.

This is the same as SetSymbolicSize() except that it uses the given font size as the normal font size instead of the standard font size.

Since:
  2.9.2

virtual void wxFont::SetUnderlined | ( | bool | underlined | ) | `[virtual]`

Sets underlining.

Parameters:

  | underlined | true to underline, false otherwise.

See also:
  GetUnderlined()

virtual void wxFont::SetWeight | ( | wxFontWeight | weight | ) | `[virtual]`

Sets the font weight.

Parameters:

  | weight | One of the wxFontWeight values.

See also:
  GetWeight()

wxFont wxFont::Smaller | ( |  | ) | const

Returns a smaller version of this font.

The font size is divided by `1.2`, the factor of `1.2` being inspired by the W3C CSS specification.

See also:
  MakeSmaller(), Larger(), Scaled()

Since:
  2.9.1

wxFont wxFont::Underlined | ( |  | ) | const

Returns underlined version of this font.

See also:
  MakeUnderlined()

Since:
  2.9.2

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