[tex-live] Removed mathtime fonts -> missing metrics for belleek

[Frank Küster]

Dear TeX Live team,

last year Karl removed the mathtime (and lucida) metrics from TeX Live,
after asking

,---- http://tug.org/mailman/htdig/tex-live/2006-November/011557.html
| It seems to me that they can only cause confusion and inconsistencies
| -- any new users should be getting the packages from TUG and/or PCTeX
| (which contain everything), and the few existing users who bought the
| packages from Y&Y can get the updated files from CTAN, if they want
| them.
| 
| Am I forgetting some constituency who will miss them?
`----

Now a Debian user complained and found what we were forgetting:

> Well, I use the 'belleek' fonts in texlive-fonts-extra as drop-in
> replacement for the proprietary mathtime fonts. The font uses the
> mathtime metrics and seems to have no metrics of it's own.
> See: /usr/share/texmf-texlive/fonts/map/dvips/tetex/mt-belleek.map
> and /usr/share/doc/texlive-fonts-extra/fonts/belleek/README
> (cd /usr/share; find -name belleek, only type1 and truetype, no metrics)

I'm not completely sure how to do that, it's a bit more than activating
mt-belleek.map, because with

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{mathtime}

\begin{document}

This is text, and this is math:

\begin{equation}
  \label{eq:1}
  \sqrt[3]{\frac{a}{\pi}} = c
\end{equation}
\end{document}

I still get errors on TL 2005, but the general scheme worked.  In TL
2007, mathtime.sty is missing, and also the metrics used for the belleek
fonts. 

> Well, nobody objected (I can't be the only one that uses the belleek
> fonts, right?). Is there a recommended way within texlive to get
> times-like math in Plain TeX? (either with the belleek font, or some
> other free mathtime-like font)

Frankly, I have no idea, anyone else?

What is the license status of these metrics?

Regards, Frank


P.S. For the Debian folks only, is it acceptable for Debian to have
Type1 fonts which are well modifyable, but not the historical MetaFont
source?  
-- 
Dr. Frank Küster
Single Molecule Spectroscopy, Protein Folding @ Inst. f. Biochemie, Univ. Zürich
Debian Developer (teTeX/TeXLive)