X11 settings on a modern system

Eragon615 · 2022-11-13 21:50:28

Can someone explain to me how X11 settings get populated on Arch, specifically the font paths? I use x3270 which needs it's fonts added to the font path. I know I can just do xset fp+ /path/to/x3270/fonts and I could even add that to my zsh.rc, but I'd love to know how Arch is setting the default of /usr/share/fonts/TTF, and after installing xorg-fonts-100dpi it sets /usr/share/fonts/100dpi. I don't see anything in /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d nor do I see anything setting it in the defaults in /usr/share/X11/xorg.conf.d.

Thanks in advance.

Trilby · 2022-11-13 22:34:46

https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Fonts# … plications

Eragon615 · 2022-11-13 22:46:34

Okay, I was looking in the Xorg part of the wiki, specifically here: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/xorg#Program_requests_%22font_'(null)'%22

But this still doesn't answer my question. Doing an xset fp+ /path/to/font only persists until a reboot occurs. Does that mean that somewhere in Arch's start up, it's running those commands everytime? I did try using the mkfontdir and mkfontscale commands but they didn't do anything noticeable.

Trilby · 2022-11-13 23:03:55

Please read the linked section which - while quite short - goes beyond those two commands.

Eragon615 · 2022-11-13 23:12:15

Hmm... Either I'm dumb, or I'm not phrasing my question correctly. I understand that I can use xset fp+ /path/to/fonts and I understand that you can use a .conf file in say, /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d with font paths. So I know several ways to make those fonts work. But where I'm lost is, how is Arch doing this by default? I don't see a single .conf file with a FontPath section, so unless there's an xset fp+ /path/blah/blah somewhere buried in some startup script, I'm really at a loss as to how the default of /usr/share/fonts/TTF is getting set. And when I installed the 100dpi fonts, they also got set (after a relog). I even listed the package in pacman to see if it was adding a .conf file somewhere, but it's not. How is it getting set?

seth · 2022-11-14 07:23:06

There's a difference between X11 fonts and fontconfig and also the server has built-in font paths.

https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Font_c … Font_paths

The font paths initially known to Fontconfig are: /usr/share/fonts/, ~/.local/share/fonts (and ~/.fonts/, now deprecated). Fontconfig will scan these directories recursively

https://man.archlinux.org/man/extra/xor … n#FontPath

When this entry is not specified in the config file, the server falls back to the compiled-in default font path, which contains the following font path elements (which can be set inside a catalogue directory):
/usr/share/fonts/X11/misc/
/usr/share/fonts/X11/TTF/
/usr/share/fonts/X11/OTF/
/usr/share/fonts/X11/Type1/
/usr/share/fonts/X11/100dpi/
/usr/share/fonts/X11/75dpi/

If you want the server to be aware of font paths for clients that don't use fontconfig, you'll have to add those paths to the server configuration.

Arch Linux

#1 2022-11-13 21:50:28

X11 settings on a modern system

#2 2022-11-13 22:34:46

Re: X11 settings on a modern system

#3 2022-11-13 22:46:34

Re: X11 settings on a modern system

#4 2022-11-13 23:03:55

Re: X11 settings on a modern system

#5 2022-11-13 23:12:15

Re: X11 settings on a modern system

#6 2022-11-14 07:23:06

Re: X11 settings on a modern system

Board footer