> > Does anybody know where I can find more fonts for X? GIMP.org has two sets freefonts and sharefonts Also RH comes with 100dpi and 75dpi fonts > > The main problem is that most proportional fonts look bad as soon as > they get to 14 point. Is there a 'font-smoothing' utility like under > NT, Win95? A lot can be achieved by reorganising the font order, their is a font deuglification (I am sure this is NaW) HOWTO BTW I must compliemt the LM on the return to normal speed. -- You forgot, once we were brought here, we were robbed of our names, robbed of our language. We lost our religion, our culture, our god ... and many of us by the way we act, we even lost our minds. RH5.2 Personal 17728385 http://www.bigfoot.com/~blakdoggTitle: XFree86 Font Deuglification HOW-TO
XFree86 Font Deuglification Mini HOW-TODoug Holland, [EMAIL PROTECTED]Copyright © 1999, Doug HollandRevision 0.11, last modified February 27, 1999 How to fix ugly and unreadable X Window font problems. Table of Contents
1. IntroductionOne of the most annoying sets of problems I have had to deal with is the abysmal default fonts and font settings of X (I'm talking specifically about XFree86, other versions of X may be better.) Many programs use fixed width default fonts when a variable width font would be more appropriate. Other programs use fonts that are ridiculously tiny and unreadable. The fonts that are bundled with XFree86 are barely adequate for the job. It does come with a halfway decent courier font, but its Times and Helvetica fonts are simple bitmap fonts that pixelize when they are scaled. Yuck! This HOW-TO attempts to show how to adjust various font settings, install new fonts, and do other things that will greatly improve the appearance and readability of fonts on the X Window Desktop. This is done by adjusting the FontPath in the XF86Config file, by adding switches to X server command line in startx or xdm, by adding new fonts, by installing the TrueType font server xfstt, and by using a feature in the K Desktop Environment 1.1 that automagically adjusts font settings in many applications, including non-KDE apps to set their fonts and colors to match KDE's style settings. Comments, corrections, additions and critiques are always welcome. You can reach me at [EMAIL PROTECTED]. 1.1 Change Log
2. The XF86Config fileThe first place to look when seeking to cure font problems is the XF86Config file. (/usr/X11/lib/X11/XF86Config or /etc/X11/XF86Config are the usual locations.) If you haven't guessed already, the most important part of this file relating to fonts is the FontPath. Before we get into that, this would be a good time to check the other parts of your X configuration. Bad monitor settings can be even more of a headache than bad fonts, so make sure your refresh rate is as high as your monitor can handle (85 Hz is great, 75 Hz is OK, 60 Hz is painful.) 2.1 Setting the FontPathUse your favorite text editor and edit XF86Config. Near the top of the file, you should see something like this: FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/misc/" FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Type1/" FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Speedo/" FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi/" FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi/" The FontPath tells X where to find the fonts it uses to render text on your display. Order is important -- when an X application asks X to render some text, the X server usually has some leeway to choose the font that is used. The X server then goes through the FontPath and grabs the first font it sees that matches the X client's criteria, and then renders. The default FontPath typically puts 75dpi fonts before the 100dpi fonts. If you have a high resolution display, this means very tiny fonts. The first tweak you'll use is to switch the 75dpi & 100dpi FontPath lines. FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/misc/" FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Type1/" FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Speedo/" FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi/" FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi/" Next, specify that you prefer to use unscaled bitmap fonts. If you've ever used Netscape or any other program that displays titles using big fonts, you'll notice that those fonts are pixelized. This is very ugly and needs to be fixed. So add :unscaled to the ends of the misc, 100dpi & 75dpi fonts. You can even use both unscaled and scaled fonts if you want, just put the unscaled FontPath lines first to tell X you prefer unscaled fonts if possible. FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/misc:unscaled" FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi:unscaled" FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi:unscaled" FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Type1" FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Speedo" FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/misc" FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi" FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi" After making these changes, restart X. Doesn't the desktop look better already?
3. X server command line optionsThe next thing you need to do is adjust the command line options for the X server. You'll want to use the -dpi switch which specifies the display resolution in dots per inch. As a lot of systems use high resolution displays these days, chances are they'll be working at 100 dpi. If you start X from the console command prompt, type startx -dpi 100. If you use xdm for graphical logins, you'll want to edit your /usr/X11/lib/X11/xdm/Xservers file, which will have the command line for the Xserver in it. Mine has the line :0 local /usr/X11R6/bin/X -dpi 100 -gamma 1.6 More information is in the X and Xserver man pages.
4. TrueType fonts (one of the few things Windows is good for)Because the boys at Redmond are very concerned with the appearance of their software (as opposed to the internal workings ;) they built TrueType font support into Windows. Windows 95 and nearly every other variety of Windows comes with Arial, Times New Roman, and Courier New, which are roughly equivalant to Helvetica, Times and Courier. TrueType fonts are scalable, so they look good in large sizes, and they are well hinted, so they are readable at small sizes. Many windows applications come with dozens of TrueType fonts. Don't microwave your Windows CD yet, you'll want to get the fonts first. 4.1 xfsttUnfortunately, XFree86 does not come with built in TrueType support, so you'll have to add it yourself. The easiest way of doing this is with xfstt, a free TrueType font server. 4.1.1 Installationxfstt is very easy to install. First, you'll want to download the tarball from the web. The most current version is at http://metalab.unc.edu/pub/Linux/X11/fonts/Xfstt-0.9.10.tgz Once you have the tarball, untar it. tar -zxvf Xfstt-0.9.10.tgz Then build it and install it. Read the INSTALL file for quick instructions, but it's a no brainer. make; make install is all you have to do. Once that's done, copy the TrueType fonts you've managed to get from various sources to /usr/ttfonts, and you're ready to go. Start xfstt by typing xfstt --sync # updates xfstt's font database xfstt & # runs xfstt in the background. Then type xset +fp unix/:7100 # tells X about xfstt. or add FontPath "unix/:7100" to your XF86Config to tell X about the font service. 4.1.2 Adjusting the default font size.If your TrueType fonts appear to be very tiny, the following commands help. Add the -dpi switch to your X server command line (see section 3 to do this.) Use the --res switch to tell xfstt to increase the default resolution. Use the following command line. xfstt --res 120 5. KDEKDE is one of the best things that have happened to Linux and X in a long time. It provides a consistent user interface that goes a long way towards making Linux accessable to the average non-geek. More information about KDE can be found at http://www.kde.org/. So why am I singing it's praises here? This is because KDE 1.1 has a new feature that will make the fonts & colors in your programs, including non-KDE applications consistent with KDE's current style. 5.1 Applying KDE font & colors to non KDE apps.This is very easy. Simply start up the KDE Control Center, go to Desktop, and go to Style inside Desktop. In there, there will be a toggle switch labled "Apply fonts and colors to non-KDE apps". Turn it on, click OK, and your done! The next time you start up many X applications, they will use the same colors and fonts that your KDE applications do. Some people may like this feature better than others, but if you don't like it you can always turn it off.
6. Adjusting fonts in specific applications:6.1 Netscape Navigator/CommunicatorNetscape Communicator is particularly susceptible to font problems. If you're using the default FontPath, your fonts will be very tiny and very ugly. The first thing you'll want to do is fix your XF86Config FontPath (see section 2.) Using 100dpi fonts improves readability immensly. You'll also want check your font settings under Edit/Preferences, under Appearance/Fonts. To get rid of bitmap font pixelization, turn off the option "Allow Scaling" on the font selection. If you have xfstt, Netscape is perfectly capable of using TrueType fonts. However, it doesn't handle xfstt's quirkiness very gracefully. In Edit/Preferences, you can specify TrueType fonts as the variable and fixed width fonts, however Netscape will not remember the size you've picked after you closed it. If you haven't used the -dpi switch when starting the X server or used the --res switch in xfstt, you'll get very tiny fonts. Once I applied these two fixes, TrueType fonts work great. 6.2 WordPerfectComing soon. 6.3 StarOfficeComing soon.
7. Credits
Created by Doug Holland Thanks go to:
8. LegalitiesCopyright © 1999 by Doug Holland. Unless otherwise stated, Linux HOWTO documents are copyrighted by their respective authors. Linux HOWTO documents may be reproduced and distributed in whole or in part, in any medium physical or electronic, as long as this copyright notice is retained on all copies. Commercial redistribution is allowed and encouraged; however, the author would like to be notified of any such distributions. All translations, derivative works, or aggregate works incorporating any Linux HOWTO documents must be covered under this copyright notice. That is, you may not produce a derivative work from a HOWTO and impose additional restrictions on its distribution. Exceptions to these rules may be granted under certain conditions; please contact the Linux HOWTO coordinator for more information. In short, we wish to promote dissemination of this information through as many channels as possible. However, we do wish to retain copyright on the HOWTO documents, and would very much like to be notified of any plans to redistribute the HOWTOs, this one in particular! Web page authors are free to link to this HOWTO without restriction, though the author would appreciate an email informing him of this, just so he can boost his ego by knowing who else reads and links to this document. Many of the terms mentioned in this document are trade names. Unless otherwise stated, all trademarks are property of their respective owners.
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