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The Adobe-Japan1-7 Character Collection

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Last updated 2019-06-11


Introduction

The purpose of this document is to define and describe the Adobe-Japan1-7 character collection, which enumerates 23,060 glyphs, and whose designation is derived from the following three /CIDSystemInfo dictionary entries:

CIDFont resources that reference this character collection must include a /CIDSystemInfo dictionary that matches the /Registry and /Ordering strings shown above.

This document is designed for font developers, for the purpose of developing Japanese fonts for use with PostScript products, or for developing OpenType/CFF Japanese fonts. It is also useful for application developers and end users who need to know more about the glyphs in this character collection. This document expects that its readers are familiar with the CID-keyed font file format, which is described in Adobe Technical Note #5014, entitled Adobe CMap and CIDFont Files Specification.

A character collection contains the glyphs that are required to develop font products for a specific language, script, or market. Specific encodings are defined through the use of CMap resources that are instantiated as files, and generally reference a subset of the character collection.

The character collection that results from each Supplement includes the glyphs associated with all earlier Supplements. For example, Supplement 7 includes all glyphs defined in Supplements 0 through 6.

The Adobe-Japan1-7 character collection enumerates 23,060 glyphs, specifically CIDs 0 through 23059, among eight Supplements, designated 0 through 7. Adobe-Japan1-7 completely supports the current JIS (Japanese Industrial Standard) character set standards, and earlier vintages thereof, specifically JIS X 0208:1997, JIS X 0213:2004, and JIS X 0212-1990, along with the two-kanji square ligature form of Japan’s new era name that took effect on 2019-05-01. The following table summarizes these eight Supplements, and also provides the pages on which their glyphs are shown in the Adobe-Japan1-7.pdf file:

SupplementAdditional CIDsCID RangeTotal CIDsDate of EstablishmentPages
08,2840–82838,28419921–17
1758284–83588,359199317
23618359–87198,720199317–18
36348720–93539,3541998-0918–19
46,0909354–1544315,4442000-02-2119–31
54,87315444–2031620,3172002-0931–41
62,74120317–2305723,0582004-03-0541–47
7223058–2305923,0602019-04-0147

Each CID (Character ID) in a character collection is associated with a glyph in which a set of character shape variations is abstracted. Specific shapes included in the set are dependent on the typeface style and possibly other factors. Glyphs for all CIDs are illustrated in this document, providing a specific example or instance of the correspondence between a CID and its glyph. Font developers should design glyphs for each CID of the character collection, and may use this document as a reference when proofing or otherwise validating CIDFont resources.

The following sections detail the history and contents of each of the eight Supplements of the Adobe-Japan1-7 character collection.


Supplement 0—Adobe-Japan1-0

Supplement 0, which enumerates 8,284 glyphs, specifically CIDs 0 through 8283, was designed to be glyph-compatible with OCF (Original Composite Format) fonts, whose glyph set was published in Adobe Technical Note #5031, entitled Kanji Glyph Collections and Glyph Sets (included in this project as the 5031.JapaneseOCF.pdf file). Supplement 0 thus includes the glyphs necessary to support the 1978 and 1983 vintages of the JIS X 0208 character set standard in terms of the number of glyphs, JIS X 0201-1997, and JIS83-based vendor character sets established by Apple (Macintosh KanjiTalk Version 6), Fujitsu, and NEC.

Special Notes

In order to maintain stability and ensure predictability, the glyphs for kanji that correspond to CIDs 1125 through 7477 should be designed such that they are JIS90 compatible.

We further recommend that the glyphs for CIDs 243 and 245—along with their pre-rotated counterparts in Supplement 3, specifically CIDs 8962 and 8964—be designed in such a way that they are centered within their half-width (500-unit) advances, thus making them look better when used between digits.


Supplement 1—Adobe-Japan1-1

Supplement 1 provides 75 additional glyphs, specifically CIDs 8284 through 8358, that are necessary to support JIS X 0208-1990 (aka JIS90), Apple’s Macintosh KanjiTalk Version 7.1 character set, and JIS90-based vendor character sets set forth by Fujitsu and NEC. Supplement 1 thus includes glyphs for the two so-called JIS90 kanji, specifically JIS X 0208-1990 凜 (84-05; U+51DC) and 熙 (84-06; U+7199). The two-kanji square ligature form of the 平成 (heisei) era, ㍻ (JIS X 0213:2000 1-13-63; U+337B), is also among the glyphs that are included in Supplement 1.

Special Notes

In order to maintain stability and ensure predictability, the glyphs for kanji that correspond to CIDs 8284 and 8285 should be designed such that they are JIS90 compatible.


Supplement 2—Adobe-Japan1-2

Supplement 2 adds 361 glyphs, specifically CIDs 8359 through 8719, that are used to support the Microsoft Windows Version 3.1J character set. IBM Select Kanji make up the vast majority—359 of the 361 glyphs—of the glyphs that were added for Supplement 2. Those who are familiar with IBM Select Kanji may know that it includes 360 kanji. The reason why Supplement 2 includes only 359 IBM Select Kanji is because one of them, 昂 (IBM 0xFAD0; JIS X 0208:1997 25-23; U+6602), was already included in Supplement 0, specifically at CID+1993.


Supplement 3—Adobe-Japan1-3

Supplement 3 enumerates 634 additional glyphs, specifically CIDs 8720 through 9353, and was designed to add only pre-rotated versions of all non–full-width Latin and Latin-like glyphs found in Supplement 2 and earlier, for the specific purpose of supporting the OpenType 'vrt2' (Vertical Alternates and Rotation) GSUB (Glyph SUBstitution) feature.

Special Notes

We recommend that the glyphs for CIDs 8962 and 8964—along with their unrotated counterparts in Supplement 0, specifically CIDs 243 and 245—be designed in such a way that they are centered within their half-width (500-unit) advances, thus making them look better when used between digits.


Supplement 4—Adobe-Japan1-4

Supplement 4 represents the very first “Pro” (short for Professional) character collection with its 6,090 additional glyphs, specifically CIDs 9354 through 15443, and is designed to satisfy most professional and commercial printing needs. By comparison, Supplement 3 is referred to as a “Std” (short for Standard, meaning that the glyph repertoire is largely based on character set standards) character collection. “Pro” fonts thus effectively leap beyond standards, and provide glyphs that are necessary for professional and commercial printing.

Special Notes

The glyphs for CIDs 12220 through 12227 are intended to be decorative in nature, and can therefore vary from typeface to typeface, or from type foundry to type foundry. The representative glyphs for this range of eight CIDs merely illustrate the glyphs that are used for the Kozuka Mincho (小塚明朝) typeface design.

Adobe-Japan1-4 Design Objectives

In order to satisfy the needs of professional and commercial printing in Japan, a wide variety of character and glyph sets were referenced. These included common vendor extensions, proprietary glyph sets, common gaiji sets, and the JIS X 0212-1990 character set. Adobe-Japan1-4 was not intended to be a Gaiji Solution, but rather was designed to meet most of the professional and commercial printing needs in Japan. Put simply, Supplement 4 was specifically designed to allow sophisticated users to compose complex documents with a minimum use of so-called gaiji fonts.

Adobe-Japan1-4 Technical Details

In order to ensure glyph consistency across fonts of different type foundries, the JIS X 0208:1997 kanji—CIDs 1125 through 7477, 8284, and 8285 in Supplements 0 and 1—must be JIS90-compliant. This is due to the fact that some of the JIS X 0208:1997 kanji variants in Supplement 4 are sometimes subtle in their difference with their standard (JIS90) forms. The following is a summary of the glyph classes that are included in Adobe-Japan1-4:

Over 2,000 kanji and kanji variants are included, and are ordered and categorized as follows:

The above list of kanji and kanji variants can be misleading, because some glyphs categorized in an earlier glyph classes may be included in a later glyph classes. For example, all JIS X 0212-1990 kanji are in Unicode, and some JIS X 0212-1990 kanji are also K-JIS kanji. These 2,000 or so kanji and kanji variants include support for the following sets of kanji or kanji variants, some of which were partially supported in Supplement 2 and earlier:


Supplement 5—Adobe-Japan1-5

Supplement 5 continues the expansion of the “Pro” character collection by adding 4,873 glyphs, specifically CIDs 15444 through 20316, and is designed to support the Apple Mac OS X Version 10.2 glyph set, which is also referred to as APGS (Apple Publishing Glyph Set). Supplement 5 is also designed to support the JIS X 0213:2000 character set and NLC (National Language Council) kanji (published on 2000-12-08).

JIS X 0213:2000 Coverage

JIS X 0213:2000 includes 4,344 characters. Its 2004 revision, designated JIS X 0213:2004, added ten kanji, bringing its total to 4,354 characters. The glyphs for some JIS X 0213:2004 kanji are found in Supplement 4, but the vast majority are in Supplement 5. The following CIDs and CID ranges represent the Supplement 5 glyphs that correspond to JIS X 0213:2004 and variant forms thereof, vertical or otherwise:

15462–15463, 15472–15479, 15486–15490, 15505–15516, 15600–15607, 15694–15722, 15725–15882, 15912–15975, 15983–15984, 16068–16070, 16071–16075, 16162–16190, 16193–16282, 16299–16311, 16327, 16329–16349, 16352–16411, 16414–16447, 16450–16466, 16483–16490, 16497–16501, 16516–16685, 16715–19129, 19312, 19346, 20297–20316

Note that there are three JIS X 0213:2004 kanji in Supplement 6, specifically CIDs 21072 through 21074.

NLC Glyph Coverage

Supplement 5 includes 38 glyphs that effectively complete the coverage for NLC kanji, which is a set of 1,022 kanji established in late 2000. Many NLC kanji are found in JIS X 0208:1997 as-is, or are included in Supplement 4. The following is a complete list of the 38 NLC kanji glyphs in Supplement 5, along with their related JIS X 0208:1997 forms in parentheses:

19312 (4570), 19346 (4738), 20175 (5741), 20222 (3505), 20263 (1666), 20264 (5020), 20265 (4036), 20266 (5976), 20267 (5704), 20268 (6662), 20269 (1402), 20270 (1662), 20271 (1243), 20272 (1791), 20273 (1850), 20274 (6481), 20275 (6258), 20276 (1892), 20277 (4368), 20278 (5629), 20279 (1998), 20280 (2171), 20281 (2085), 20282 (2523), 20283 (5707), 20284 (2059), 20285 (5937), 20286 (3086), 20287 (3251), 20288 (3379), 20289 (3538), 20290 (1494), 20291 (3628), 20292 (6325), 20293 (3822), 20294 (3832), 20295 (6537), 20296 (6510)


Supplement 6—Adobe-Japan1-6

Supplement 6 adds 2,741 glyphs, specifically CIDs 20317 through 23057, to completely support the JIS X 0212-1990 character set, and thus obsoletes the Adobe-Japan2-0 character collection, described in Adobe Technical Note #5097, entitled Adobe-Japan2-0 Character Collection for CID-Keyed Fonts (included in this project as the 5097.Adobe-Japan2-0.pdf file). Also included are the glyphs necessary to support Kyodo News’ U-PRESS character set.

Special Notes

CID+20958 is rendered as a full-width space in this specification, and serves as a placeholder glyph for NTT’s FreeDial symbol. For those font developers who have the right or permission to use NTT’s FreeDial symbol in their font products, CID+20958 has been allocated for this specific purpose. Note that the latest Unicode CMap resources map U+27BF ➿ DOUBLE CURLY LOOP to CID+20958.

JIS C 6226-1978 Coverage

Supplement 6 includes a glyph for one additional JIS78 (aka JIS C 6226-1978) kanji, specifically CID+21071 (溢󠄂).

JIS X 0213:2004 Coverage

Supplement 6 includes three glyphs, specifically CIDs 21072 through 21074, that are intended to complete JIS X 0213:2004 coverage. These three glyphs are for kanji in JIS X 0213:2000 proper, and not among the ten kanji that were added as part of its 2004 revision.

JIS X 0212-1990 Coverage

Supplement 6 adds the necessary glyphs to completely cover the JIS X 0212-1990 character set, which contains 6,067 characters. Note that the glyphs for the majority of the JIS X 0212-1990 characters are found in earlier Supplements. The glyphs for CIDs 21075 through 23057 are specifically intended to support JIS X 0212-1990 kanji.

The JIS X 0212-1990 and JIS X 0213:2004 character sets significantly overlap, and some characters are shared by them in terms of sharing the same Unicode mapping, and have glyphs that differ, sometimes in very subtle ways. The following list provides thirty-seven pairs of CIDs, specifically the JIS X 0213:2004 form’s CID, followed by the corresponding JIS X 0212-1990 form’s CID in parentheses:

144 (20319), 140 (20320), 7610 (20321), 15739 (20341), 15747 (20359), 16786 (21164), 17469 (21371), 17510 (20107), 15390 (14510), 14541 (21558), 16889 (14609), 17755 (21722), 17850 (21791), 15395 (14741), 14762 (21933), 15397 (14766), 16977 (8561), 18115 (22006), 14160 (22010), 16987 (20177), 13893 (7725), 16994 (22045), 18201 (22063), 17014 (14904), 18316 (22186), 17041 (8592), 18514 (22341), 18713 (22583), 17168 (15238), 18858 (20239), 18854 (22788), 15405 (15269), 18905 (22843), 15319 (22920), 17205 (13372), 19068 (20257), 19091 (23006)

U-PRESS Coverage

With a couple minor exceptions, the glyphs for CIDs 20473 through 20960 are intended for supporting Kyodo News’ U-PRESS character set.


Supplement 7—Adobe-Japan1-7

Supplement 7 adds exactly two glyphs, specifically CIDs 23058 and 23059, which respectively represent the horizontal and vertical forms of the two-kanji square ligature form of the name of Japan’s new era, 令和 (reiwa), which began on 2019-05-01. This character was added to Unicode Version 12.1 as U+32FF ㋿ SQUARE ERA NAME REIWA.


Kana Subset Definitions

In terms of font products developed by Adobe, three different Kana subsets have been defined, and are categorized by typeface family and Supplement. Although kana fonts can be used stand-alone, as independent fonts, their limited glyph set means that they are best used as a component of a Composite Font, which is functionality found in Adobe InDesign and other higher-end applications. The table below details each kana subset, along with the number of glyphs and their CIDs and CID ranges:

Kana SubsetSupplementGlyphsCIDs & CID Ranges
Kamono Kana Family13730—0, 232–233, 238–240, 243, 245–258, 262, 290, 292, 295, 326–331, 503–514, 633–642, 651–655, 659–661, 663, 665–666, 668, 670–679, 682–693, 695–697, 708–709, 711–719, 723–739, 780–789, 842–1010, 7612, 7887–7888, 7891–7892, 7894–7895, 7897, 7899–7904, 7907–7939, 7958–7960, 8009–8014, 8210, 8264–8265, 8268, 8273–8283 & 1—8307, 8313–8316
Kamono Kana Family34150—0, 232–233, 238–240, 243, 245–258, 262, 290, 292, 295, 326–331, 503–514, 633–642, 651–655, 659–661, 663, 665–666, 668, 670–679, 682–693, 695–697, 708–709, 711–719, 723–739, 780–789, 842–1010, 7612, 7887–7888, 7891–7892, 7894–7895, 7897, 7899–7904, 7907–7939, 7958–7960, 8009–8014, 8210, 8264–8265, 8268, 8273–8283 & 1—8307, 8313–8316 & 3—8951–8952, 8957–8959, 8962, 8964–8977, 8981, 9009, 9011, 9014, 9048, 9084–9089, 9265–9275
Ryo Family12140—0, 633–635, 651–654, 657–658, 660, 842–1010, 7887–7888, 7891, 7918–7939, 7958–7960, 8264–8265 & 1—8313–8316

For those developers who wish to include a complete set of proportional Latin glyphs with their kana font products, to make the fonts more usable as stand-alone fonts, we suggest that the glyphs for CIDs 1 through 230 (Supplement 0) and 8720 through 8949 (Supplement 3) be included.


Special Glyphs & Other Notes

The following sections detail special glyphs and other notes that are of interest to font developers. Several glyph classes are complex, and deserve some amount of explanation and clarification.

Space Glyphs

The following table lists all of the Adobe-Japan1-7 glyphs that are classified as a space, or are otherwise rendered as a space, and provides information with regard to their intended usage, along with their recommended advances:

CIDAdvanceDescription
1ProportionalLatin space—U+0020
231Half-widthLatin space—U+2002
326Half-widthKatakana space
422Half-widthGeneric space
515Half-widthHiragana space
633Full-widthIdeographic space—U+3000
8229Full-widthGeneric space
8720Full-widthPre-rotated version of CID+1
8950Full-widthPre-rotated version of CID+231
9084Full-widthPre-rotated version of CID+326
9179Full-widthPre-rotated version of CID+515
9276Full-widthPre-rotated version of CID+422
9444ProportionalItalic space—U+0020
12960Full-widthPre-rotated version of CID+9444
15444Full-widthFor AAT (Apple Advanced Typography) compatibility—U+F860
15445Full-widthFor AAT compatibility—U+F861
15446Full-widthFor AAT compatibility—U+F862
15447Full-widthFor AAT compatibility—U+F87A
15448Full-widthFor AAT compatibility—U+F87F
20958Full-widthPlaceholder glyph for NTT’s FreeDial symbol—U+27BF

The space glyphs that are described as a pre-rotated version of another glyph must be assigned full-width advances in terms of their horizontal advances, but when instantiated as an OpenType font, their vertical advances as specified in the OpenType 'vmtx' (Vertical Metrics) table should match those of their unrotated counterparts.

Kana Glyphs

Adobe-Japan1-7 includes a rich variety of kana in terms of glyph classes, specifically half-width, full-width, full-width tuned for horizontal and vertical writing, proportional, ruby, and a special set for U-PRESS.

Kana Glyph ClassHorizontal CIDs & CID RangesVertical CIDs & CID Ranges
Half-width326, 332–389, 391–421, 515–5989084, 9090–9262
Full-width643–644, 651–654, 660, 842–1010, 7958–7960, 8313–8316, 12181, 12269, 12271, 16195, 16209–16221, 16236–16252, 16326, 163277891, 7918–7939, 8264–8265, 8271–8272, 12108–12110, 12270, 12272, 16333–16349
Tuned12273–12455, 16352–1638112456–12638, 16382–16411
Proportional15449–15452, 15455, 15462–15463, 15517–1572415976–15979, 15982–16192
Ruby12649–12652, 12671–12854, 12867, 16414–1644912855–12866, 12868, 16450–16468
U-PRESS20473–20496n/a

Kanji Glyphs

Adobe-Japan1-7 includes 14,664 glyphs that are classified as kanji (aka ideographs), and their CIDs and CID ranges, separated by Supplement, are shown in the table below:

SupplementCIDs & CID Ranges
0656, 1125–7477, 7633–7886, 7961–8004, 8266–8267
18284–8285
28359–8717
413320–15443
516779–20316
621071–23057

The aj17-kanji.txt datafile provides detailed information for each of these 14,664 kanji.

Ruby Glyphs

Supplements 4 and 5 include glyphs that are suitable for typesetting ruby (aka furigana), and the vast majority of the glyphs are for kana, though glyphs for one kanji and some symbols are also included. Although these ruby glyphs are unencoded, they can be used by applications that support the OpenType 'ruby' (Ruby Notation Forms) GSUB feature. The following table details the CID ranges for the ruby glyphs in Supplements 4 and 5:

SupplementCID Ranges
412639–12869
516412–16468

Italic Glyphs

Italic glyphs were introduced in Supplement 4, and additional ones are also found in Supplements 5 and 6. The table below explicitly indicates the CID ranges for the italic glyphs in these three Supplements, along with their corresponding pre-rotated glyphs within the same Supplement:

SupplementItalic CID RangesPre-Rotated CID Ranges
49444–973712960–13253
515912–1597516715–16778
620372–2042621016–21070

Pre-Rotated Glyphs

In order to support the OpenType 'vrt2' (Vertical Alternates and Rotation) GSUB feature, the Adobe-Japan1-7 character collection includes pre-rotated forms for all Latin and Latin-like glyphs that are not full-width. The table below details how horizontal CIDs and CID ranges map to their corresponding pre-rotated CID ranges:

SupplementHorizontal CIDs & CID RangesPre-Rotated CID Ranges
31–325, 390, 501–503, 599–628, 630–632, 8718–8719, 326–389, 391–421, 515–598, 423–424, 504–514, 422, 425–500, 6298720–9353
49354–9778, 12063–1208712870–13319
515456–15461, 15464–15516, 15725–1597516469–16778
620317–2042620961–21070

Glyph Advances

The following table provides CIDs and CID ranges that explicitly indicate which glyphs are intended to be designed with proportional-, half-, third-, or quarter-width advances. All other glyphs are expected to have full-width advances.

AdvanceCID Ranges
Proportional1–230, 9354–9737, 15449–15975, 20317–20426
Half-width231–632, 8718–8719, 12063–12087
Third-width9758–9778
Quarter-width9738–9757

The glyph tables that are provided in this project include registration marks that serve to indicate relative glyph advance. Explicitly specifying width classes, such as in the above table, is clearly a more accurate and reliable reference than measuring the distance between registration marks. Please use both resources as your guide.

Note that the registration marks used in the glyph tables are in a separate layer, and if their presence is annoying, that layer can be easily turned off, thereby preventing their display.

Duplicate Kanji Glyphs

For historical reasons and for JIS90-compliance, the following three Supplement 0 kanji glyph pairs represent genuine duplicate glyphs, and their JIS83 (aka JIS X 0208-1983) forms in Supplement 4 are shown for the sake of comparison:

Primary GlyphDuplicate GlyphJIS83 Form
4301—匕󠄀7983—匕󠄁13523—𠤎󠄀
4411—喩󠄀7984—喩󠄁13526—喩󠄂
5459—渣󠄀7994—渣󠄁13558—渣󠄂

For the purposes of full compliance and character collection integrity, the duplicate glyphs shown above shall be maintained.

In addition, the glyphs for CIDs 3603—蔽󠄀 (Supplement 0) and 13505—蔽󠄂 (Supplement 4) are identical when rendered with the Kozuka Mincho typeface design, but may be rendered differently for other typeface designs.

Glyph Variation

In order for fonts based on the Adobe-Japan1-7 character collection to be useful, meaningful, consistent, and predictable, the glyphs that correspond to the kanji in the JIS X 0208:1997 character set standard must be designed in such a way that they are JIS90-compliant, meaning that their glyphs match the representative glyphs set forth in the JIS X 0208-1990 standard. As mentioned earlier, this affects CIDs 1125 through 7477 (6,353 glyphs) in Supplement 0, along with CIDs 8284 and 8285 in Supplement 1. Subtle glyph variations of kanji glyphs in Supplement 4 and beyond make this necessary.

For font developers who wish to build JIS2004-savvy OpenType/CFF fonts, meaning those whose default glyphs match the representative glyphs set forth in the JIS X 0213:2004 standard, the strong JIS90-compliance recommendation still applies, because the JIS2004-savviness is achieved at the character code, not CID, level, through the use of JIS2004-savvy CMap resources that map the same Unicode code points to CIDs whose glyphs match the JIS X 0213:2004 representative glyphs. JIS2004-savvy font development is covered later in this specification.

The JIS standards, specifically JIS X 0208:1997, JIS X 0212-1990, and JIS X 0213:2004, and earlier versions thereof, along with the JIS-related material found in the appendixes of the book entitled CJKV Information Processing, Second Edition (O’Reilly Media, 2009), serve as the ideal glyph references for Adobe-Japan1-7, at least for the glyphs that correspond to these standards. Some glyphs do not correspond to characters found in any JIS standard, in which case Unicode and ISO/IEC 10646 serve as the ideal glyph reference, and in some cases the only glyph reference beyond this document. The aj17-kanji.txt datafile, described in the section that follows, also provides references to other standards that can also be consulted in terms of glyph references.


CMap Resources

The CMap resources associated with the Adobe-Japan1-7 character collection, along with more complete descriptions and the cid2code.txt datafile that provides additional details for font developers, are available as part of the open source CMap Resources project.

In general, the CMap resources that are based on legacy encodings, such as Shift-JIS, are no longer being updated. Rather, the Unicode CMap resources—available for UTF-8, UTF-16 (UTF-16BE), and UTF-32 (UTF-32BE) encodings, and kept perfectly synchronized—are updated on a regular basis, with new mappings being triggered by a new Supplement or a new version of Unicode. Furthermore, the UCS-2 CMap resources are obsolete and deprecated. Developers should use the UTF-16 CMap resources instead, because they are forward compatible with the now-obsolete UCS-2 ones.

The aj17-kanji.txt datafile provides additional information for all 14,664 kanji in Adobe-Japan1-7.


Unicode Variation Sequences

The Ideographic Variation Sequences (IVSes) that are specified in the Adobe-Japan1_sequences.txt datafile are registered by The Unicode Consortium in the IVD (Ideographic Variation Database) per UTS #37 (Unicode Ideographic Variation Database). This datafile also includes a small number of Standardized Variation Sequences (SVSes), and all but two of them correspond to CJK Compatibility Ideographs.


OpenType/CFF Font Development

Given today’s dominance of OpenType fonts, this section provides information intended to help with OpenType/CFF font development efforts with regard to those built based on the Adobe-Japan1-7 character collection. Adobe considers the minimum Supplement for an OpenType/CFF Japanese font to be 3, specifically Adobe-Japan1-3. The sections that follow provide information on building JIS2004-savvy OpenType/CFF fonts, and detail an industry-standard naming convention.

JIS2004-Savvy OpenType/CFF Fonts

All Adobe-Japan1-7 fonts are JIS2004-compatible, because all of the representative glyphs shown in the JIS X 0213:2004 standard proper are included, but may not be the default, in terms of whether they are encoded. Whether a glyph is encoded is a function of the CMap resource that is used, and in the case of OpenType/CFF fonts, it is a function of what CMap resource is used to build the Formats 4 and 12 'cmap' subtables.

When developing JIS2004-savvy OpenType/CFF fonts, specifically those whose default glyphs match the representative glyphs set forth in the JIS X 0213:2004 character set standard, the appropriate UTF-32–encoded CMap resource must be used to build the Formats 4 and 12 'cmap' subtables. For fonts based on Supplements 3 through 5, additional glyphs beyond each Supplement are necessary, and this requires the advertised Supplement to be set to 6. For Supplements 3 through 5, the following table details the number of glyphs that are necessary beyond those in each of these Supplements, and also indicates which JIS2004-savvy CMap resources should be used to build their Formats 4 and 12 'cmap' subtables:

SupplementAdvertised SupplementCMap ResourceCIDs
37UniJIS2004-UTF32-H or UniJISX02132004-UTF32-HAdobe-Japan1-3 + 145 Supplement 4–7 glyphs
47UniJIS2004-UTF32-H or UniJISX02132004-UTF32-HAdobe-Japan1-4 + 83 Supplement 5–7 glyphs
57UniJIS2004-UTF32-H or UniJISX02132004-UTF32-HAdobe-Japan1-5 + 12 Supplement 6 & 7 glyphs

The advertised Supplement is the integer value that is recorded in the /Supplement entry of the /CIDSystemInfo dictionary of the CIDFont resource. The following table provides a complete listing of the additional glyphs necessary for each of these three special-case JIS2004-savvy OpenType/CFF font types, distinguished by Supplement:

SupplementGlyphsCIDs & CID Ranges
31454—9354, 9779, 12101, 12870, 13320–13327, 13330, 13332–13333, 13335–13341, 13343, 13345–13355, 13358–13369, 13371, 13373–13382, 13385–13388, 13391–13400, 13402, 13460, 13495, 13538, 13624, 13650, 13673, 13731, 13803, 13860, 13893, 13915, 13949, 13964, 14013, 14066, 14074, 14111, 14116, 14196, 14272, 14290 & 5—16977, 17041, 18760, 19312, 19346, 20175, 20222, 20263–20296, 20301–20305, 20307, 20314 & 6—21072–21074 & 7—23058
4835—16413, 16444–16449, 16467–16468, 16889, 16905, 16977, 17014, 17041, 17168, 17205, 18759–18760, 19061, 19312, 19346, 20175, 20222, 20263–20296, 20299–20310, 20312–20315 & 6—21071–21074, 21558, 21933, 22010, 22920 & 7—23058–23059
5126—21071–21074, 21371, 21558, 21722, 21933, 22010, 22920 & 7—23058–23059

Because the scope of each Supplement is different, in terms of coverage of JIS standards, the additional glyphs required beyond each Supplement are not in a subset/superset relationship. For example, the scope of Supplements 3 and 4 is JIS X 0208, for Supplement 5 is it JIS X 0208 and JIS X 0213, and for Supplement 6 it is JIS X 0208, JIS X 0213, and JIS X 0212.

OpenType/CFF Font Naming Conventions

In order to clearly distinguish OpenType/CFF Japanese fonts based on different Supplements, we strongly recommend that the names used for the fonts, specifically the /CIDFontName string and the OpenType menu names in the 'name' table, include a designator for this purpose. The table below illustrates the naming convention that is in current use, and thus industry standard, and provides example /CIDFontName and OpenType menu name strings with the designator emboldened:

SupplementDesignatorJIS2004-Savvy Designator/CIDFontName & Menu Name Examples
3StdStdNKozMinStd-Regular, 小塚明朝 Std R & KozMinStdN-Regular, 小塚明朝 StdN R
4ProProNKozMinPro-Regular, 小塚明朝 Pro R & KozMinProN-Regular, 小塚明朝 ProN R
5Pr5Pr5NKozMinPr5-Regular, 小塚明朝 Pr5 R & KozMinPr5N-Regular, 小塚明朝 Pr5N R
6Pr6Pr6NKozMinPr6-Regular, 小塚明朝 Pr6 R & KozMinPr6N-Regular, 小塚明朝 Pr6N R
7Pr6Pr6NKozMinPr6-Regular, 小塚明朝 Pr6 R & KozMinPr6N-Regular, 小塚明朝 Pr6N R

This naming convention also allows JIS2004-savvy OpenType/CFF fonts to coexist with earlier versions of the same font, even if they are based on the same Supplement. Also, the advertised Supplement does not affect which designator is used. For example, a JIS2004-savvy Adobe-Japan1-3 font includes 145 additional glyphs from Supplements 4 through 7, but “StdN” shall be used as its designator.

Special Notes

We recommend that Adobe-Japan1-7 fonts use Adobe-Japan1-6 designators, as specified in the table above, mainly due to the addition of only two glyphs in Supplement 7. This recommendation applies to fonts for both existing and new typeface designs.


Glyph Tables

Representative glyphs for CIDs 0 through 23059 are provided in the Adobe-Japan1-7.pdf file that is included in this project, with 500 glyphs shown per page. And, for reader convenience, the beginning of each Supplement is clearly marked. The typeface used to exemplify each glyph is Kozuka Mincho Pr6N R (aka KozMinPr6N-Regular or 小塚明朝 Pr6N R), designed by Adobe, and an Adobe Originals typeface available for license. The specific font instance is Version 7.000, as reflected in its /CIDFontVersion dictionary entry.


Changes Since Earlier Versions

The following sections detail the history of this document, which was originally referred to as Adobe Technical Note #5078. Note that references to specific sections no longer correspond to the sections found in the current version of this specification.

Since the 1993-06-11—Supplement 0—Version

Supplements 1 and 2 were added, with the glyphs shown in Sections 4 and 5, respectively.

Since the 1994-10-04—Supplement 2—Version

Morisawa’s RyuminPro-Light (Ryumin Light KL) typeface design is now used for the representative glyphs for each CID—FDPC’s HeiseiMin-W3 (Heisei Mincho W3) was previously used. Supplements 3 and 4 were added, with the glyphs shown in Sections 6 and 7, respectively.

Since the 2000-03-31—Supplement 4—Version

KozMinPro-Light (Kozuka Mincho Pro L), an Adobe Original typeface design, is now used for the representative glyphs for each CID—RyuminPro-Light was previously used. The representative glyphs for CIDs 13863 and 15438 were corrected, and the representative glyphs of the following CID pairs were exchanged:

Since the 2000-08-12—Supplement 4—Version

The representative glyphs for CIDs 15408 and 15435 were corrected.

Since the 2000-11-01—Supplement 4—Version

The representative glyphs are from KozMinPro-Light (Kozuka Mincho Pro L) with /CIDFontVersion value 1.011. The representative glyphs for CIDs 740, 8270, 12068, and 13300 were modified, and the representative glyphs for CIDs 7879 and 8002 were corrected.

Since the 2002-06-21—Supplement 4—Version

All 23,058 representative glyphs are from KozMinProVI-Light (Kozuka Mincho Pro-VI L) with /CIDFontVersion value 6.004. The representative glyphs for Supplements 5 (CIDs 15444 through 20316) and 6 (CIDs 20317 through 23057) were added as Sections 8 and 9, respectively. The following 24 additional glyphs were added to the Adobe-Japan1-0 kana subset definition in Section 1.1: CIDs 7958–7960, 8009–8014, 8210, 8264–8265, 8268, and 8273–8283. Glyph variation notes for CIDs 140, 144, 9583, and 9587 were removed from Section 1.4. Special notes for CIDs 243 and 245 were added in Section 3.1. Special notes for CIDs 8962 and 8964 were added in Section 6.1. Special notes for CIDs 12220 through 12227 were added in Section 7.1. The representative glyphs for CIDs 243, 245, 8962, and 8964 were modified so that they are centered within their half-width (500-unit) advances, and the representative glyphs for CIDs 6510, 7803, 7967, 7981, 9437, 12953, 14935, and 15310 were corrected.

Since the 2004-06-11—Supplement 6—Version

The representative glyphs for CIDs 740, 1879, 8270, 12068, and 13300 were corrected. KozMinPr6N-Regular (Kozuka Mincho Pr6N R) with /CIDFontVersion value 6.002 was used for the representative glyphs. The entire specification was completely revised.

Since the 2008-02-15—Supplement 6—Version

The representative glyphs for CIDs 7721, 7752, 7780, 7984, 8547, 15825, and 16628 were corrected, and the representative glyphs for CIDs 8721–8949, 12870–12959, 12961–13253, 16469–16778, and 20961–21070 were shifted 47 units to the right. KozMinPr6N-Regular (Kozuka Mincho Pr6N R) with /CIDFontVersion value 6.004 was used for the representative glyphs. The entire specification was ported to GitHub markdown syntax and revised.

Since the 2017-10-03—Supplement 6—Version

The Anticipated Changes section was moved to the project’s Wiki for easier maintenance.

Since the 2017-10-05—Supplement 6—Version

Adobe Tech Note #5097, for the deprecated Adobe-Japan2-0 character collection, was added for historical purposes.

Since the 2017-10-08—Supplement 6—Version

Minor editorial changes.

Since the 2017-10-09—Supplement 6—Version

Minor editorial changes.

Since the 2017-12-08—Supplement 6—Version

Supplement 7 and its representative glyphs (CIDs 23058 and 23059) were added, and additional editorial changes were made.

Since the 2019-04-01—Supplement 7—Version

A Japanese translation of the specification was added, along with some minor editorial changes.

That is all.