Code "ZXX" is used when there is: "No linguistic content; Not applicable." The project started with a genuine question: How can we conceal our fundamental thoughts from artificial intelligences and those who deploy them? I decided to create a typeface that would be unreadable by text scanning software (whether used by a government agency or a lone hacker) — misdirecting information or sometimes not giving any at all. -- Source

ZXX is a free Open Type Font designed to frustrate text scanning software while still being legible by humans. I unzipped the files into my ~/.fonts/ and /usr/local/share/fonts on my ubuntu 14.04 machine and did sudo fc-cache -f -v. The fonts were ready to go now and I could see that they show up nicely inside libreoffice and screen-message. However, I wanted a way that I can script the content into images. I searched around and messed with postscript and enscript but the tool that really gave me the best results was pango-view.

pango-view --no-display --text="Hello, World!" --font='Zxx Noise' --waterfall --output=hello.png
pango-view -qt "Hello World" --font="Zxx Camo" --waterfall -o hello2.png
pango-view -qt "Hello World" --font="Zxx False" --dpi=300 -o hello3.png

I saw from this test strip that I would need to adjust the font size and resolution. The --background option is nice in that it offers transparency. For longer text input you will want to set the --wrap flag. Here's an example with a Bruce Sterling quote:

pango-view -qt 'The ruins of the unsustainable are the 21st century's frontier.' --font='Zxx Camo' --dpi=200 --width=200 --wrap=word -o out-test.png

I want to know how he got a different type for every character. I think my best bet is to make a script that will iterate over the string, change the font flag, and print the letter. Each output in pango-view is an image so this could make things tricky. I could stick the images together with imagemagick; a geeky method of magazine clippings and elmers glue. Let me know if you have any ideas that can rotate between the different fonts. In the meantime, here's what the processed poem looks like: