Checking available font styles and shapes

Question

I am using a usefont{<encoding>}{<family>}{<series>}{<shape>} command, as described here, I use it with Lato fonts \usefont{T1}{fla}{l}{n}.

My question is how can I check which series and shapes are supported by fonts that are installed in my system. Specifically, which letters I can put in {series}{shape}.

fc-list | grep lato gives me the list as below. How can I refer these names to letters in \usefont ?

/usr/share/fonts/truetype/lato/Lato-Medium.ttf: Lato,Lato Medium:style=Medium,Regular
/usr/share/fonts/truetype/lato/Lato-SemiboldItalic.ttf: Lato,Lato Semibold:style=Semibold Italic,Italic
/usr/share/fonts/truetype/lato/Lato-LightItalic.ttf: Lato,Lato Light:style=Light Italic,Italic
/usr/share/fonts/truetype/lato/Lato-Italic.ttf: Lato:style=Italic
/usr/share/fonts/truetype/lato/Lato-MediumItalic.ttf: Lato,Lato Medium:style=Medium Italic,Italic
/usr/share/fonts/truetype/lato/Lato-Black.ttf: Lato,Lato Black:style=Black,Regular
/usr/share/fonts/truetype/lato/Lato-Light.ttf: Lato,Lato Light:style=Light,Regular
/usr/share/fonts/truetype/lato/Lato-Regular.ttf: Lato:style=Regular
/usr/share/fonts/truetype/lato/Lato-ThinItalic.ttf: Lato,Lato Thin:style=Thin Italic,Italic
/usr/share/fonts/truetype/lato/Lato-HairlineItalic.ttf: Lato,Lato Hairline:style=Hairline Italic,Italic
/usr/share/fonts/truetype/lato/Lato-Thin.ttf: Lato,Lato Thin:style=Thin,Regular
/usr/share/fonts/truetype/lato/Lato-BoldItalic.ttf: Lato:style=Bold Italic
/usr/share/fonts/truetype/lato/Lato-Bold.ttf: Lato:style=Bold
/usr/share/fonts/truetype/lato/Lato-Heavy.ttf: Lato,Lato Heavy:style=Heavy,Regular
/usr/share/fonts/truetype/lato/Lato-Semibold.ttf: Lato,Lato Semibold:style=Semibold,Regular
/usr/share/fonts/truetype/lato/Lato-HeavyItalic.ttf: Lato,Lato Heavy:style=Heavy Italic,Italic
/usr/share/fonts/truetype/lato/Lato-BlackItalic.ttf: Lato,Lato Black:style=Black Italic,Italic
/usr/share/fonts/truetype/lato/Lato-Hairline.ttf: Lato,Lato Hairline:style=Hairline,Regular

Answer 1

Initially, I misread your request.

I recommend looking at https://latex-project.org/guides/fntguide.pdf to understand the <encoding>, <family>, <series>, and <shape>.

"Lato" is a True Type font, and the encoding is, I believe, EU1, not T1. The family is "Lato"

From the above document:

The most common values for the font series are:
m Medium
b Bold
bx Bold extended
sb Semi-bold
c Condensed

The most common values for the font shape are:
n Normal (that is ‘upright’ or ‘roman’)
it Italic
sl Slanted (or ‘oblique’)
sc Caps and small caps