is there any guide to a usable font configuration on arch?

itti · 2012-01-14 14:54:11

Hi,

I wonder if there is any guide/how to/advice on how to setup the fonts on arch. What I'm looking for is some straight forward advice on what ttf-* packages ought to be installed, what configurations be activated at /etc/fonts/conf.d and what xft settings should be propagated via .Xresources and gnome-settings-daemon to reach a simple usable overall font configuration.

Basically I thought that the default configuration was usable until I discovered that one is supposed to either install microsoft core fonts (which the wiki tells me to be deprecated in favor of the windows 7 fonts) or ttf-liberation for most websites to look remotely like they were intended by their designers. Lacking any windows installation media I went with the liberation fonts just to discover that they do render rather poorly with the default font configuration. Characters like 'R' looked plain wrong as the slanted slope was rendered way too thin, almost disappearing (excuse my bad description, I have no supporting screenshots at the moment...).
After that I tried the ubuntu patched packages for fontconfig, freetype, etc... They do render the liberation fonts better but introduce problems of their own (fonts, especially bold ones, tend to get too wide and big). My next try was to use the infinalty patched packages instead of the ubuntu ones but I'm not even sure what kind of settings I have to make to get them to look any good...

To me the problem with the font configuration stack under linux is that it's too obscure and there are too many (possibly conflicting) settings all over the place. That's why I didn't post any of my current settings here. I do not want to iterate on my current settings. All I'm looking for is some straight-forward advice on how to reach a basic usable configuration without too much personal tweaking. I do accept not having the most beautiful or advanced font rendering I could have. All I want is something that works and doesn't look too bad or simply wrong (in the case of not installed ms compatible fonts).

Last edited by itti (2012-01-14 14:55:15)

rps63ifid · 2012-01-14 15:19:21

I'll second this... seems like a great addition to the wiki. The current entry in the wiki for fonts has good information, but it would be great addition to cover the topics above you've touched on.

--
/ron

Trilby · 2012-01-14 15:24:47

itti wrote:

... I discovered that one is supposed to either install microsoft core fonts ... Lacking any windows installation media...

I don't know about the whole process or what concerns you have - but you don't need windows installation media. ttf-ms-fonts is in the AUR. I have not touched any windows disks nor had windows on my system - I just did a normal arch + X install, and added ttf-ms-fonts and I'm quite happy with how everything looks/works.

ZekeSulastin · 2012-01-14 15:32:45

1) I'd suggest using the infinality patches for freetype2, available as freetype2-infinality in the AUR. Upstream's website for that has decent documentation; if I recall correctly, there's also a fontconfig-infinality package now, to stick the default infinality config in /etc and give a little message defining what environment variables you can set.

2) For websites, I'd recommend installing both ttf-win7-fonts and ttf-mac-fonts - the macfonts package will get the fonts from some Safari related document; if you lack media for the Win7 fonts, it's a bit suckier as you have to download the entire W7SP1 installer so maybe not those

I'll see if I can work on the wiki later tonight ...

graysky · 2012-01-14 16:26:20

@Zeke - what exactly does the infinality package offer? It's not clear to me even after reading the upstream page

brebs · 2012-01-14 16:32:51

Not easy to write a wiki article - there's so many options available for users to tweak to their liking. So, a decent article would still be an effort for users to read and understand - don't be surprised if the target audience are too lazy to read it properly!

The problem with font rendering is that everyone's eyes and monitor is different, so it's always a case of "experiment to find what looks good for you." Which basically means, there's not much of a shortcut.

litemotiv · 2012-01-14 16:54:03

Coming (back) from OSX, i've grown to like it's font rendering a lot. Many linux users will find it too fuzzy, but for me it seems closest to how many font designers intended their fonts to look.

Today i've spent some time trying to mimick it as much as possible, tried many different combinations including infinality with the -OSX setting. It didn't really work for me, maybe because there are just too many settings and tweaks there. The best results i've found so far are:

- ubuntu patchsets (cairo-ubuntu, fontconfig-ubuntu, freetype2-ubuntu, libxft-ubuntu)

- the additional ~/.fonts.conf below

<?xml version='1.0'?>
<!DOCTYPE fontconfig SYSTEM 'fonts.dtd'>
<fontconfig>
	<match target="font">
		<edit mode="assign" name="lcdfilter">
		  <const>lcddefault</const>
		</edit>
		<edit mode="assign" name="hinting">
			<bool>true</bool>
		</edit>
		<edit mode="assign" name="antialias">
			<bool>true</bool>
		</edit>
		<edit mode="assign" name="autohint">
			<bool>false</bool>
		</edit>
		<edit mode="assign" name="hintstyle">
			<const>hintslight</const>
		</edit>
	</match>
 </fontconfig>

(some of the above settings might already be set in /etc/fonts/conf.d/ and could be left out, but it doesn't hurt to leave them)

Note that you should only try this if you are looking for an OSX-like rendering, many might find it too bold or fuzzy for their taste (no subpixel rendering nor autohinting). Also don't try this if you don't have a high PPI screen, it'll probably look nasty.

If you want less fuzziness, i would personally not increase the hinting level but start looking at subpixel rendering and autohinter differences first. A good start to try in that case is adding:

<edit mode="assign" name="rgba">
	<const>rgb</const>
</edit>

Last edited by litemotiv (2012-01-14 16:55:18)

karol · 2012-01-14 17:02:28

itt wrote:

Characters like 'R' looked plain wrong as the slanted slope was rendered way too thin, almost disappearing (excuse my bad description, I have no supporting screenshots at the moment...).

I've had 'the R problem' too (only in firefox IIRC), but it went away on its own.

monacelli · 2012-01-14 21:01:09

Since I like the way Ubuntu renders fonts the best, I install the Ubuntu font patches from the AUR. I take it a step further and use a copy of Ubuntu's /etc/fonts/conf.d, /etc/fonts/conf.avail, as well as the fonts from Ubuntu's /usr/share/fonts/TTF + a few of the ms fonts. I find it easier to do this instead of using pacman to download the different font packages. In XFCE I set the default font to Droid Sans/10, enable anti-aliasing, slight hinting, RGB sub-pixel order, 96 custom dpi.

lorin · 2012-01-14 22:35:08

The nice thing about infinality, imo, is their filter parameters (/etc/profile.d/infinality-settings.sh) that allow for tweaking the FIR filter at runtime instead of compile. The half dozen presets covered in the comments provide a variety of rendering from sharp and light Windows/Freetype style rendering, to an agressively smooth OSX type look. Once you've installed the patches, t's trivial to switch between various presets, or create your own, until you achieve your desired look. And I guess that is a prime example why writing a wiki on usable font configuration is a daunting task, as covered above.

itti · 2012-01-15 10:11:05

So in the meantime I've been able to acquire some win7 installation media and now I've installed all major font packages (ttf-win7-fonts, ttf-mac-fonts, ttf-google-webfonts). I'm still not sure why there is both /etc/profile.d/infinality-settings.sh and /etc/fonts/infinality/infinalty.conf. I guess I'm supposed to set the same "styles" in both of them. I went with the "infinality"-called presets there. So my configuration now is actually usable but still not that great. At least there are no longer any plainly wrong looking characters but that might be due to the fact that I now have official fonts like Arial installed. Still I'm not able to find any decent documentation covering the whole infinality setup process as probably stuff like XFT-settings propagated by gnome-settings-daemon and the X11 discovered DPI might matter.

Last edited by itti (2012-01-15 20:48:09)

masteryod · 2012-01-15 11:38:43

So it's not only me who have issues with font configuration, good to know. I was always installing ttf-ms-fonts from aur and that was good enough (i didn't do any other font config whatsoever), recently I tried ttf-vista-fonts, then switched to ttf-win7-fonts but it introduce some rendering errors, I was told to try infinality so I did but after two days of tests, 52-infinality.conf - infinality-settings.sh - .fonts.conf hell (I'm still not sure if I understand it correctly) and firefox issues I went back to ttf-ms-fonts. I didn't manage to get font rendering to be good and error free at the same time and nowhere near to be as clear as native Windows 7 fonts

So yeah there is interest to solve this once for all and nice comprehensive wiki page would be great

graysky · 2012-01-15 11:44:05

Thanks for posting this thread, itti. I'm much happier with the way my system renders fonts now.

Required packages:
freetype2-infinality
fontconfig-infinality
droid-sans

I didn't modify any files provided by these packages. I simple selected the win7 rendering style using /etc/fonts/infinality/infctl.sh setstyle

# /etc/fonts/infinality/infctl.sh setstyle
Select a style:
1) debug       3) linux	      5) osx2	     7) win98
2) infinality  4) osx	      6) win7	     8) winxp
#? 6
conf.d -> styles.conf.avail/win7

XFCE4 settings:
Settings> Appearance >Fonts
Default Font: Drioid Sans: 10
Anti-aliasing: Enabled
Hinting: Full
Sub-pixel order: None

Tabs in chromium:

Text in chromium:

From terminal:

Last edited by graysky (2012-01-15 11:59:33)

litemotiv · 2012-01-15 13:08:48

I'll put up my screens for comparison:

vYzl4dQ

vYzl4dg

lolilolicon · 2012-01-15 13:28:51

@graysky Is it my screen being different from yours or do your fonts look absolutely horrible? @litemotiv your fonts look pretty OK to me.

On topic, one thing I find about font rendering is that it depends heavily on the specific font being rendered.

Last edited by lolilolicon (2012-01-15 13:29:58)

graysky · 2012-01-15 13:31:58

@loli - they look nice to me?

hadrons123 · 2012-01-15 13:35:30

@litemotiv your terminal fonts are better.What font do you use?

litemotiv · 2012-01-15 13:42:06

hadrons123 wrote:

@litemotiv your terminal fonts are better.What font do you use?

Just monospace (DejaVu Sans Mono) / ttf-dejavu in [extra]

hadrons123 · 2012-01-15 13:44:35

@litemotiv thanks!.Even though your terminal fonts looks great compared to graysky inspite of both having infinality,I feel graysky's browser font rendering is good.

litemotiv · 2012-01-15 13:47:50

hadrons123 wrote:

@litemotiv thanks!.Even though your terminal fonts looks great compared to graysky inspite of both having infinality,I feel graysky's browser font rendering is good.

The difference between my browser and terminal rendering is probably the size, i have my terminal font set 2 points higher.

P.s., graysky uses infinality and i use ubuntu.

graysky · 2012-01-15 14:01:45

My terminal for is monospace 10 and it's the only thing that looks right to me. In fact, I absolutely love my terminal display but others feel that it's looks bad? Am I missing something?

litemotiv · 2012-01-15 14:04:05

graysky wrote:

My terminal for is monospace 10 and it's the only thing that looks right to me. In fact, I absolutely love my terminal display but others feel that it's looks bad? Am I missing something?

You have strong hinting in your terminal, usually that's just a matter of taste...

brebs · 2012-01-15 14:53:25

lolilolicon wrote:

@graysky Is it my screen being different from yours

Yes - the screen resolution and DPI (dots per inch) are crucial.

This is why screenshots of font rendering can be misleading.

You have to actually try it yourself, then tweak it to your liking.

graysky · 2012-01-15 14:57:36

brebs wrote:

lolilolicon wrote:
@graysky Is it my screen being different from yours
Yes - the screen resolution and DPI (dots per inch) are crucial.
This is why screenshots of font rendering can be misleading.
You have to actually try it yourself, then tweak it to your liking.

Thanks for the feedback. For reference, my shit runs @ 1920x1080 @ 100 dpi.

brebs · 2012-01-15 15:09:23

graysky wrote:

100 dpi.

DPI consists of 2 numbers

$ xdpyinfo | grep -B1 dot
dimensions: 1920x1080 pixels (372x231 millimeters)
resolution: 131x119 dots per inch

If you really have 100x100 - best to say 100x100.

Last edited by brebs (2012-01-15 15:10:06)

Arch Linux

#1 2012-01-14 14:54:11

is there any guide to a usable font configuration on arch?

#2 2012-01-14 15:19:21

Re: is there any guide to a usable font configuration on arch?

#3 2012-01-14 15:24:47

Re: is there any guide to a usable font configuration on arch?

#4 2012-01-14 15:32:45

Re: is there any guide to a usable font configuration on arch?

#5 2012-01-14 16:26:20

Re: is there any guide to a usable font configuration on arch?

#6 2012-01-14 16:32:51

Re: is there any guide to a usable font configuration on arch?

#7 2012-01-14 16:54:03

Re: is there any guide to a usable font configuration on arch?

#8 2012-01-14 17:02:28

Re: is there any guide to a usable font configuration on arch?

#9 2012-01-14 21:01:09

Re: is there any guide to a usable font configuration on arch?

#10 2012-01-14 22:35:08

Re: is there any guide to a usable font configuration on arch?

#11 2012-01-15 10:11:05

Re: is there any guide to a usable font configuration on arch?

#12 2012-01-15 11:38:43

Re: is there any guide to a usable font configuration on arch?

#13 2012-01-15 11:44:05

Re: is there any guide to a usable font configuration on arch?

#14 2012-01-15 13:08:48

Re: is there any guide to a usable font configuration on arch?

#15 2012-01-15 13:28:51

Re: is there any guide to a usable font configuration on arch?

#16 2012-01-15 13:31:58

Re: is there any guide to a usable font configuration on arch?

#17 2012-01-15 13:35:30

Re: is there any guide to a usable font configuration on arch?

#18 2012-01-15 13:42:06

Re: is there any guide to a usable font configuration on arch?

#19 2012-01-15 13:44:35

Re: is there any guide to a usable font configuration on arch?

#20 2012-01-15 13:47:50

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#21 2012-01-15 14:01:45

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#22 2012-01-15 14:04:05

Re: is there any guide to a usable font configuration on arch?

#23 2012-01-15 14:53:25

Re: is there any guide to a usable font configuration on arch?

#24 2012-01-15 14:57:36

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#25 2012-01-15 15:09:23

Re: is there any guide to a usable font configuration on arch?

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