Using pseudo items to display coverage annotation

Coverage annotation features store certain display characteristics in pseudo items. These include size, symbol, offset distances, and text string and are stored in the coverage annotation text attribute table (TAT) in the fields $ALIGN, $FIT, $ID, $JUSTIFY, $LEVEL, $OFFSETX, $OFFSETY, $SIZE, $SYMBOL, $TEXT, and $WORD. In addition, any regular text attributes stored in the TAT are available in the attribute table. You can view these via the attribute table once the annotation has been added to ArcMap as a layer, but you cannot modify them. To enable change in appearance of coverage annotation in ArcMap, you can alter the symbols used for display through the categories in $SYMBOL and $LEVEL. This functionality is accessible through the layer properties and governs the display in ArcMap. It is important to note that if $SIZE is not set to 0, you cannot change the size of the text symbol in ArcMap.

Learn how to display coverage annotation

Finding a matching font

Two types of fonts are available in ArcInfo Workstation:

• AGFA Intellifonts (font.txt)
• IGL fonts (plotter.txt)

Intellifonts contain a set of common typefaces that can be matched to TrueType font equivalents available in Microsoft Windows. See the table below for reference. However, the IGL fonts don't have any standard TrueType equivalents and must, therefore, be replaced.

AGFA Intellifont	Closest standard Windows equivalent
Univers Medium	Arial
CS Triumvirate	Arial
CS Triumvirate Condensed	Arial Narrow
CS Times	Times New Roman
Omega	Microsoft Sans Serif
CG Palacio	Palatino Linotype

AGFA Intellifonts and the closest standard Windows equivalent fonts

ArcMap can use any TrueType, OpenType, or Type 1 font available on the system. You can license and install any fonts separately in addition to the standard set.

Symbol characteristics

Most of the other symbol characteristics in an ArcInfo Workstation text set have either a direct equivalent in ArcMap or a similar property that can be set on the text symbol.

ArcInfo Workstation text symbol characteristic	ArcInfo Workstation pseudo item	ArcMap text symbol property equivalent
TEXTFONT	N/A	Font
TEXTQUALITY	N/A	Character Spacing
TEXTSPACING—character	$FIT	Character Spacing
TEXTSPACING—line	N/A	Line Spacing
TEXTSIZE	$SIZE	Size^1
TEXTCOLOR	N/A	Color
TEXTMASK	N/A	Text Background
TEXTJUSTIFICATION	$JUSTIFY	X-, Y-Offset^2
TEXTALIGNMENT	$ALIGN	Vertical-, Horizontal-Alignment^2
TEXT-ANGLE, SLANT, PENSIZE, LINECAP, LINEJOIN	N/A	N/A

ArcInfo symbol characteristics and equivalents in ArcMap

¹ Size is overridden by the pseudo item if $SIZE is not equal to 0.

² These ArcMap properties have no effect as they are overridden by the pseudo items $JUSTIFY and $ALIGN, respectively.

ArcMap provides many symbol properties that are unavailable in ArcInfo Workstation, such as fill pattern, advanced background options, and shadow.

Managing annotation size

There are two ways in ArcInfo Workstation to set the annotation height in a coverage:

• As map units stored in a pseudo item named $SIZE. If this is done, you can't change the size of the annotation when it's displayed in ArcMap.
• As the text symbol's size when $SIZE is set to 0. ArcMap uses the text symbol you assign when drawing at all scales.

ArcMap uses the point typesetting unit, not the map unit, to specify text size. When coverage annotation size is in map units ($SIZE is not equal to 0), ArcMap displays the annotation at the correct map unit size. Because of this, the size of the text symbol will appear larger as you zoom in and smaller as you zoom out.