Can't display non-unicode font

Question

When I try to use Symbol font and display it in JLabel, it show a square.
i have read the article written by John O'Conner
http://www.joconner.com/javai18n/articles/TextDisplay.htm.
Thanks for providing those valuable information. it does help to understand some international issue.
however, I am not sure if it apply to Symbol font such as Wingdings, webdings.
    Font fontPalatino = new Font( "Palatino LinoType", Font.PLAIN, 25); //unicode font
    Font fontMapInfo = new Font( "MapInfo Transportation", Font.PLAIN, 25); // non-unicode font
    Font fontWingdings  = new Font( "Wingdings", Font.PLAIN, 25);
          // use integer number and convert into equivalent character
          // e.g. if i is 65 then c is A.
          // notes: 65 is a decimal value converted from hex 0041 value
          int i = 65;
          char c = (char)i;
          System.out.println( new Character(c).toString() );
          JLabel jlbl = new JLabel();
          jlbl.setFont(fontSymbol);
          jlbl.setText( new Character(c).toString() );1) I can't display any Wingdings font , any expert can help on this?
2) what is the difference between 0021(character code for Arial font) and 0x21(character code for Wingdings font) shown in character map?

Answer 1

When I try to use Symbol font and display it in
JLabel, it show a square.
i have read the article written by John O'Conner
http://www.joconner.com/javai18n/articles/TextDisplay.htm.
Much of that article is now incorrect or unnecessary for JDK 1.5. Because 1.5 knows how to find a font for the character you're trying to display, you should be able to set your label font to any logical font, and the JRE should find a substitute font if necessary that can display the character.
I'll give your code a try and will post results...is the code you've posted the code I should actually experiment with? It seems like you should want to display something different than 0x0065.
Your other questions:
0x0021 is the exclamation mark regardless of font. I see what you mean, however, since the wingdings font in charmap also says 0x0021. However, that mapping is obviously not a Unicode code point mapping.
I looked in the Misc. Symbols and Dingbats section of Uncode. A few characters might be a reasonable substitution for the pencil character you want:
0x270E (LOWER RIGHT PENCIL)
0x270F (PENCIL)
0x2710 (UPPER RIGHT PENCIL)
I didn't see any mirror images of these, ie LOWER LEFT PENCIL and UPPER LEFT PENCIL, although I admit that I didn't look closely.
Maybe one of these will work for you instead of the Wingdings 0x21 character you mentioned.
Regards,
John O'Conner