[texhax] Font Size Question

[Reinhard Kotucha]

On 23 June 2010 Axel E. Retif wrote:

 > On  22 Jun, 2010, at 22:15, Reinhard Kotucha wrote:
 > 
 > > On 22 June 2010 Axel E. Retif wrote:
 > > 
 > >> The OP asked:
 > >> 
 > >>>> Can you tell me how you (or I) would know the defined font sizes
 > >>>> for a given class, like your book class example?  Where do you
 > >>>> look for such information, etc.
 > >> 
 > >> Well ---such information is in the bkXX.clo (for book class) and
 > >> sizeXX.clo (for article, report and letter classes).
 > > 
 > > Sure.  The OP assumed that he could solve his problem by
 > > reverse-engineering LaTeX.  You told him how to proceed.  But I'm not
 > > conviced that reverse-engineering LaTeX is a good idea.  There are
 > > better solutions.
 > 
 > Sorry, but I can't see how you consider this reverse-engineering,
 > and not \DeclareMathSizes, which you talked about in your previous
 > email. And the OP asked how he could *know* which were the defined
 > font sizes for a given (point size option in a) document class,
 > where he could "*look* for such *information*".
 > 
 > There is nothing esoteric about examining sizeXX.clo ---"The LaTeX
 > Companion", 2nd. ed., for example, says (p. 144)
 > 
 > >> ... if you select the option 11pt, one of its actions is to
 > >> change the list defaults. In the standard classes this is done
 > >> by loading the file size11.clo, which contains the definitions
 > >> for the 11pt document size.
 > 
 > And, p. 373,
 > 
 > >> For best results, however, one needs to use a document class
 > >> designed for the selected document fonts or, lacking such a
 > >> class, to redefine the commands \normalsize, \footnotesize, and
 > >> so on...

Even if it's mentioned in "The LaTeX Companion" I don't see any good
reason to bother a casual user with such low-level stuff.
 
 > Well ---the only thing the OP needs is to ensure that the smallest
 > font size in his document is 7pt, 

\let\tiny\relax  (or better, \errmessage)

I fear that redefining \tiny has no impact on math formulas. 

 > to comply with some in-house rule established by people who usually
 > don't know anything about typography.

Why do you assume that they don't know anything about typography?
They noticed that fonts smaller than 7pt are incomprehensible.  This
is a reasonable decision.  At least unless the fonts used are
especially designed for this particular size.  And only Knuth's fonts
support "design sizes".

Regards,
  Reinhard

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