GDI+ - Why the MeasureString function fails with a Courier font?

Question

I'm using RAD Studio XE7. In several projects, I use a common code to get the bounding box surrounding a text (in pixels), using the GDI+ MeasureString function:

// configure the font to use. NOTE be careful, the SVG font size matches with the
// GDI font HEIGHT property, and not with the font SIZE
std::auto_ptr<TFont> pTextFont(new TFont());
pTextFont->Name   =  fontFamily;
pTextFont->Height = -fontSize;
std::auto_ptr<Gdiplus::Font> pFont(new Gdiplus::Font(pCanvas->Handle, pTextFont->Handle));

// char range is required to extract the first char bounds
Gdiplus::CharacterRange charRange;
charRange.First  = 0;
charRange.Length = 1;

// configure the text format
std::auto_ptr<Gdiplus::StringFormat> pTextFormat(new Gdiplus::StringFormat());
pTextFormat->SetAlignment(Gdiplus::StringAlignmentNear);
pTextFormat->SetLineAlignment(Gdiplus::StringAlignmentNear);
pTextFormat->SetFormatFlags(Gdiplus::StringFormatFlagsNoWrap);
pTextFormat->SetTrimming(Gdiplus::StringTrimmingNone);
pTextFormat->SetMeasurableCharacterRanges(1, &charRange);

Gdiplus::RectF boundingBox;
Gdiplus::RectF viewBoxF(viewBox);

// measure the rect surrounding the text
if (pGraphics->MeasureString(text.c_str(), text.length(), pFont.get(), viewBoxF,
        pTextFormat.get(), &boundingBox) != Gdiplus::Ok)
{
    // error is handled here
}

This function works well in several cases, however sometimes MeasureString fails inexplicably, returning InvalidParameter as error message, while e.g. the font parameters are the following:

pTextFont->Name   =  L"Courier";
pTextFont->Height = -16;

I first thought that it could be a font fallback issue. I tried to implement the following solution to get the fallback font: How to automatically choose most suitable font for different language?

However, this did not resolve my issue:

1. In the above mentioned case, the returned fallback font is also Courier, meaning that in some manner my system considers this font as valid (unless the font fallback code itself is broken, but I think that it's not the case)
2. For another project written in Delphi, I translated the above code, and I face the exactly same issue
3. The GDI (not GDI+) seems able to use this font through functions like SelectObject and DrawText (the returned rect seems valid when measured with DrawText and DT_CALCRECT)
4. The GDI+, on the other hand, seems unable to do something with the font (the one instantiated in pFont). The drawing functions also fail

Somebody can explain to me what I doing wrong?

Answer 1

Contrary to what I thought, GDI+ does not support all the installed font, as said in the DrawString function remarks (https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ms535991(v=vs.85).aspx) :

Note that GDI+ does not support PostScript fonts or OpenType fonts which do not have TrueType outlines.

It seems that the Courier font belongs to that kind of fonts that cannot be used "as is" with GDI+. For that reason, if my draw fails with GDI+, I need to either use the GDI instead, or provide a substitution font.