Text along a curve
Reading is a path the eye walks. The path does not have to be a straight horizontal line. Pretext gives exact character widths; a parametric curve gives a position and a tangent at each arc-length. Put them together and text follows any shape you want.
Mechanism
We define a parametric path p(t) → (x, y) where t ∈ [0, 1]. For each character we compute its cumulative width via canvas measureText, map that width to an arc-length fraction along the path, look up the point, and compute the tangent angle. Then ctx.translate, ctx.rotate, ctx.fillText(char), restore.
Pretext's role here is to make it cheap to re-lay-out if the path changes — no DOM, no reflow.
Application
Spirals of text. Calligraphic flourishes where the line turns. Text that follows a signature, a breath waveform, a skyline. Headlines that arch. Anywhere the reading path itself is a design element.
"The universe is wider than our views of it."
Henry David Thoreau, Walden (1854)Direct Claude
r(θ) = r₀ + kθ, place each char at (r cos θ, r sin θ)
"headline that arches"
→
quadratic bezier, arc-length sample
Novel extension — HN commenters referenced torus and curved-text layouts as a Pretext frontier.