MLEM/Docs/articles/font_extensions.md

Font Extensions

The MLEM base package features several additional font manipulation methods, including line splitting and text truncating. These abilities can be accessed through generic fonts.

Generic fonts

MLEM features the GenericFont class along with a GenericSpriteFont implementation. This is used by the MLEM.Ui package, but it can also be used separately to have more control over font rendering.

Additionally, the MLEM.Extended package provides the following generic fonts:

• GenericBitmapFont, which uses MonoGame.Extended's SpriteFont
• GenericStashFont, which uses FontStashSharp's fonts

Creating a generic font

To create a generic font, simply create an instance of the desired generic font class when loading your game:

// Using MonoGame SpriteFonts
var spriteFont = new GenericSpriteFont(this.Content.Load<SpriteFont>("Fonts/ExampleFont"));

Line splitting

Using generic fonts, a long line of text can be split into multiple lines based on a maximum width in pixels. The split text that is returned is delimited by \n (newline characters).

var split = spriteFont.SplitString("This is a really long line of text [...]", width: 100, scale: 1);
spriteFont.DrawString(this.SpriteBatch, split, new Vector2(10, 10), Color.White);

Alternatively, the SplitStringSeparate method returns a collection of strings, where each entry represents a place where a split has been introduced. Using this method, you can differentiate between pre-existing newline characters and newly introduced ones.

var split = spriteFont.SplitStringSeparate("This is a line of text that contains\nnewline characters!", width: 10, scale: 1);
// returns something like ["This is a line of ", "text that contains\nnewline characters!"]

Truncating

Using generic fonts, a long line of text can also be truncated to fit a certain width in pixels. The remaining text that doesn't fit will simply be chopped off of the end (or start) of the string.

// Truncate from the front
var truncFront = spriteFont.TruncateString("This is a really long line of text [...]", width: 100, fromBack: false, scale: 1);
// Truncate from the back
var truncBack = spriteFont.TruncateString("This is a really long line of text [...]", width: 100, fromBack: true, scale: 1);