In the majority of Asian scripts there are many alphabetic characters and special character combinations. Their shape may vary further according to context. For each of these scripts it is unlikely that all these numerous forms of script characters can be accommodated within the couple of hundred font elements (also called font "characters") available in a single font. Font Maker allows you to work round this problem: you design a set of elements which can be overlaid, and so compile a great range of composite characters. (Imagine how an "l" shape and an "o" shape could be put together to make a "b" shape.)

You can plan your character set (font) from scratch based on your knowledge of the Asian language and script. You may prefer to emulate what purports to be a "standard" set, such as an Indian Government standard. Sadly, there is no certainty as to standards in different countries or localities being mutually compatible. Basically, your font should be designed to allow compilation of all the compound characters, diacritics, vowel marks, stress marks, punctuation, numbers and symbols that you consider to be essential.

It is possible to mix characters from more than one font, but not overlying or overlain characters. Adjacent tall characters from different fonts may lose parts that overhang when italicised. So, tall characters and characters designed to overlap or be overlapped should all be kept in the main font, if you plan to spread character elements for a script over more than one font. Don't expect to find a spell checker for words composed of more than one font!

Font Maker enables you to set the left and right margins of each font character. Normally when a font character gets placed in a row, this character's left margin abuts the right margin of the previous character already located to its left. You can design a font character such that part of its shape extends beyond its left margin or to the right of its right margin. You can use this method to create left and right offsets and make characters which will overlie adjacent ones when they are placed together in a document. A value of at least 2 is recommended for font character width, meaning the distance between the left margin and the right margin irrespective of the character's shape and extents.

If a series of overlapping font character elements is to be enabled, then the changes in behaviour caused by their various possible combinations and their widths must be allowed for in designing the shapes and extents of the characters. Screen and printing devices usually require that the sequence of overlapping font characters be such that the leftmost mark of any one of these font characters does not extend further left than the leftmost mark of the font character located just to its left. If you do not do this, Windows will likely get confused; a gap will form between the right margin of the left character and the left margin of the right character; parts of characters may become lost and illegible.

There are two ways in which characters numbers 128 to 159 may get used by word processors or desk top publishers and other software that may use the fonts you produce: some software reserves these character numbers for lining or shading processes, but other software treats these like text characters. Some (probably old) printers or plotters may have difficulties with such characters or with left or right offsets. You may wish to consider checking whether the users of your fonts will have any problems with your proposed font design. With FontMaker you can use a high character of 127 or 255, and you can choose to whether or not to design the characters 128 to 159. Jaspell's Asian fonts mostly use the all the characters up to 255.

Some software marketted as word processing software for Asian scripts only displays a chart of the characters in a font (like Windows' "Character Map" feature). You have to select each element individually. This is extremely slow.

Alternatively, you may use a compiler programme. Some compilers progressively monitor groups of characters that have been placed in a document. The programme compares the group with internal tables of character groups and seeks to modify the group according to contextual criteria set by the designer.

Other compiler programmes like Jaspell's Jaldi Multilingual Script Processor monitor the key input sequence at the keyboard and progressively modify the current local group or syllable. For example, "kaa" would begin as "k`", this would be replaced by "ka", and finally by the elements that form the syllable "kaa". If the shape of "kaa" needs to change according to the subsequent character, this is done automatically. Jaspell provide a Romanized input system of this sort. They also provide a "mapped to keys" system in which the alphabet of characters for a script is distributed over and dedicated to individual upper and lower case keys of the keyboard. This arrangement can be in straight alphabetical order or some other. For Arabic, Jaspell further include a popular typewriter layout.

These cover:-
     Bengali (Assamese and Bengali);
     Devanagari (Hindi, Marathi, Nepali, Sanskrit)
     Gujarati
     Gurumukhi (Punjabi)
     Japanese Hira Gana
     Japanese Kata Kana
     Japanese Romaji
     Naskh (Arabic, Farsi, Pushtu, Urdu)
     Nastaliq (Arabic, Farsi, Pushtu, Urdu)
     Latin 1 to 4 (Accented Roman from Greenlandic to Turkish)
     Latin 5 (Vietnamese)