Arch Linux

stbug

Member

Registered: 2025-01-23

Posts: 21

[SOLVED] Linux terminal fonts

I've already read Fonts, Font configuration and Linux console (Fonts) to see how to change the terminal font. I got that, but I didn't understand how to set an installed font.
I know that the font has to be a bitmap one, so I installed ProFont which I got from Fonts (Bitmap), but I don't know how to test it with setfont or how to set it.

Last edited by stbug (2025-02-03 23:50:43)

V1del

Forum Moderator

Registered: 2012-10-16

Posts: 25,177

Re: [SOLVED] Linux terminal fonts

Afaik otb fonts are not psf fonts and not interchangeably useable. To generally know the context have you just tried out the examples that are already in the wiki?

seth

Member

From: Won't reply 2 private help req

Registered: 2012-09-03

Posts: 75,438

Re: [SOLVED] Linux terminal fonts

For the console you want a *.psf[.gz] font, it goes into /usr/share/kbd/consolefonts/ and you can permantly configure it w/ vconsole.conf
The otb will work in an X11 or wayland terminal, but not on the console (except *maybe* kmscon)
The GUI terminals however don't require bitmap fonts at all, otf and ttf will work just as much.

---

How to upload text · How to boot w/o GUI · Disable Windows Fast-Start! · Fix your xinitrc

stbug

Member

Registered: 2025-01-23

Posts: 21

Re: [SOLVED] Linux terminal fonts

Afaik otb fonts are not psf fonts and not interchangeably useable. To generally know the context have you just tried out the examples that are already in the wiki?

Yes, I tried the ones from the wiki, but there wasn't any that I liked so I went for that one thinking it would work.

For the console you want a *.psf[.gz] font, it goes into /usr/share/kbd/consolefonts/ and you can permantly configure it w/ vconsole.conf
The otb will work in an X11 or wayland terminal, but not on the console (except *maybe* kmscon)
The GUI terminals however don't require bitmap fonts at all, otf and ttf will work just as much.

I will try to search for psf fonts for the console then.
Thank you so much!

stbug

Member

Registered: 2025-01-23

Posts: 21

Re: [SOLVED] Linux terminal fonts

Well I didn't find any font that I liked so I tried to convert the JetBrains Mono Font from a ttf to psf, but is a big font and it doesn't look that good.
However, this is how I did it if anyone is interested.

I downloaded otf2bdf and bdf2psf to convert the .ttf font

otf2bdf -p 20 -r 96 -o jetbrains.bdf 'JetBrainsMono[wght].ttf'

bdf2psf --fb jetbrains.bdf /usr/share/bdf2psf/standard.equivalents /usr/share/bdf2psf/fontsets/Uni2.512 512 jetbrains.psf

Then I moved it to /usr/share/kbd/consolefonts/ and it seems to be set using setfont, but the size I think is 32 or 64 (maybe it's different but I don't know) and using the -h parameter just brokes all the characters.

I got the idea from https://www.reddit.com/r/linuxquestions … psf_files/

Last edited by stbug (2025-01-25 18:10:33)