Single color, satin-stitch-only, branched letters can be used as Nearest-Connecting-Point (NCP, or simply Nearest Point) letters. NCP lettering provides the ability to run right-to-left, center-out or any order the user wants, with minimum travel or jump distances. This happens because the letter’s stitches are sequenced so that the beginning and ending stitches are near to the previous and next letters in the sequence. When digitizing a font for NCP do not use runs to connect the satin elements, as these are created during branching. If the publishing system sees runs, it will not create an NCP letter, but will instead create a normal (and perfectly usable) letter, as-digitized.
Note: the satin branching keeps the order of your digitizing for layering purposes.
When publishing, you have choices for displaying the Nearest Point setting to the user on their Stitch properties of a lettering design. The choices are Always, Default On, Default Off and Never. The first three allow the use of the nearest point setting.
Always means you intend the font to always use the branching NCP engine. Use this when you haven’t set the individual glyph entry/exits because the font is known to operate well as branched. The use may not override this setting.
Default On / Off settings allow the user to override your preferred way of using the font. In most cases you will have digitized logical entry and exit points on all your glyphs. If you have done so, the font will sew as you intended it with the Nearest Point on or off, but Default On is preferred. Alternately, you may know that some combinations of letters are not as perfectly digitized as you would like, so you choose Default off, but leave the option up to the user.
Never means you have not designed the font to branch automatically.
Note: The Never setting does not mean you cannot branch within a glyph when digitizing it. You still can, and those branches remain exactly as you have set them. This setting is only to prevent the user from moving things around.