Text mode font bitmap, anyone?

Does anybody have a bitmap of the font normally used in text mode? Not the 8x8 one, but the 8x16 one. Google isn't helping me at all, either giving me info on how to write my own font to the VGA or downloading fonts that are completely unrelated.

I managed to find this link which helped quite a lot with this:



However, as you see, I'm still missing the control characters. This is because the program is a rasterizer for ANSI art (used a lot back in the BBS days), and I have no fucking idea of how to render the control characters :| So technically I'm just missing those, but either way, does anybody know where I can find them?

 

I only want the control codes (characters 0 1 to 31). Also I really don't see how this belongs to Technical Discussion other than for this being something used by many BIOSes. I'm not even asking anything about programming or similar at all.

EDIT: OK, not character 0, that one is blank :P

 

Er, that's an 8x12 font (moreover, that's Terminal >_>), I'm looking for the 8x16 font used by most BIOSes.

 

It's a pic of 8x16, look again. It's 224 pixels high because it's missing the two top rows (and in any case, that'd be the height for 8x14 :P).

Also DOSBox... *facepalm* Should have thought of that before That said, looks like DOSBox's font is made for 9x16 really :| I'll have to do, but if there are any alternatives, tell me :v:

 

But is largely the same across computers.

Good luck doing that on WinXP :| Besides I think that B000:0000 appears as a mirror of B800:0000 in text mode, which means that reading from there will just give me the text data and not the graphics.

Nope, it's 8x16. The 9th column is either blank or a repeat of the last column (the latter are the characters in the C0-DF range). It was added exclusively because some people didn't like the fact that the middle column of the M was one pixel wide :| It wasn't part of the original spec, and not everybody took advantage of it: for instance, the font used in this BIOS seems to be made for 8x16, as letter characters are always 7 pixels wide maximum.

 

Tell me how the hell do you fit 9 pixels in 8 bits. Also tell me what characters do those programs use - the range C0-DF has the 9th column being a repeat of the 8th one instead of being blank.

Custom program? You completely forgot about DEBUG. I used that to dump my old BIOS (and I don't have the files anymore, as usual :P). Also you could try another operating system ;P That said, Windows 98 does let DEBUG access the BIOS data :/

 

Then I want to know what kind of card are you using because the VGA uses 8 bits per character line, at least from the software viewpoint.

 

http://www.osdever.net/FreeVGA/vga/vgatext.htm

http://www.osdever.net/FreeVGA/vga/char.txt

Code (Text):

1. _____Examples_of_Text_Mode_Bitmap_Characters_____
2.           
3.   7 8x8  0  ___Legend___     7 8x16 0    7 9x16 0
4.  0—XX----  - Background    0--------   0--------
5.   -XXXX---  X Foreground     --------    --------
6.   XX—XX--  ? Undisplayed    ---X----    XX----XX
7.   XX—XX--                   —XXX---    XXX—XXX
8.   XXXXXX--                   -XX-XX--    XXXXXXXX
9.   XX—XX--                   XX---XX-    XXXXXXXX
10.   XX—XX--                   XX---XX-    XX-XX-XX
11.  7-------- <------+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;XXXXXXX-&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;XX----XX
12.  8????????&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;|&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;XX---XX-&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;XX----XX
13. &nbsp;&nbsp;????????&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; XX---XX-&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;XX----XX
14. &nbsp;&nbsp;????????&nbsp;&nbsp; Maximum Scan&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;XX---XX-&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;XX----XX
15. &nbsp;&nbsp;????????&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Line&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;XX---XX-&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;XX----XX
16. &nbsp;&nbsp;????????&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; --------&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;--------
17. &nbsp;&nbsp;????????&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;|&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;--------&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;--------
18. &nbsp;&nbsp;????????&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;|&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;--------&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;--------
19. &nbsp;&nbsp;????????&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;+------> 15--------&nbsp;&nbsp;15--------
20. &nbsp;&nbsp;????????&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 16????????&nbsp;&nbsp;16????????
21. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;...&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;...&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; ...
22. 31????????&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 31????????&nbsp;&nbsp;31????????

EDIT: bonus points to whoever makes the board to stop "fixing" the characters automatically

 

Not really, but the explanation there does look complicate. Basically:

• There are 8-bit per line. This means 8 pixels that can be defined.
• For most characters, the 9th column is set to be blank.
• For the characters in the C0-DF range, the 9th column is a repeat of the 8th one.

That's it.

Now, the deal here is to find a font that was made assuming that the 9th column doesn't exist.

 

OMG look what I found:



...WTF at the M and W. I guess I'll have to see if by any chance I still can get my old computer, but I doubt so :| I think that in the end I'll just go with a hybrid font >_>

The extended characters of that font weren't codepage 437 either :P