Problems installing bitmap (Artwiz) fonts in 9.1 for use with Fluxbox

melquiades · 03-13-2004, 01:47 PM

Hi all,
I've been trying out fluxbox recently (the bloat of KDE & Gnome was starting to wear me away) - anyway one of the many recommended things you can do is to install a set of bitmap (.pcf) fonts (the 'artwiz' pack) I've spent ages trying to get these installed, following how-to after how-to from all across the web and just can't seem to get anywhere.

Things that I've done so far that don't seem to have done much

extracted the fonts (14 .pcf files) to /home/crx/.fonts/
added above directory to XF86Config
added

Code:

Load "bitmap"

< to XF86Config load section
run

Code:

mkfontdir ~/.fonts

run

Code:

fc-cache -fv ./

which outputs:-

Code:

root@aleph:/home/crx# fc-cache -fv
fc-cache: "/usr/share/fonts": caching, 57 fonts, 0 dirs
fc-cache: "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/TTF": caching, 57 fonts, 0 dirs
fc-cache: "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Type1": caching, 29 fonts, 0 dirs
fc-cache: "/root/.fonts": caching, 5 fonts, 0 dirs
fc-cache: "/home/crx/.fonts/": caching, 5 fonts, 0 dirs
fc-cache: succeeded

and restarted X

can't access the fonts still - so 2 main questions:-
1) why is it only saying 5 fonts in the output from fc-cache when there should be 14?
2) why is it not working?

secondary questions (if anybody happens to know)
3) what the hell does fc-cache do anyway?
4) whay don't the 5 that where apparently found by fc-cache not show up in any 'font-choosing' window
&
5) can I have a beer now?

Any thoughts, help etc greatly appreciated on this one, it's really driving me up the wall, I'm not sure how much I really want the fonts but it's become somewhat of a crusade now!

Thanks on and all,
Mlqds

PS - Relevant links that might be of interest:-
www.fluxmod.dk
www.fluxbox.org
feenix.burgiss.net/ldp/fdu/index.html
jmccoy.sdf-us.org/slackware9/config/fonts/fonts.php

Kovacs · 03-13-2004, 06:03 PM

This is how I install artwiz fonts:

Make a dir /usr/X11R6/lib/fonts/artwiz and copy all the pcf files there.
chmod 644 * (or 444 *, they just all have to be world readable).

fc-cache -fv . to build the fonts.* files for that dir

Add this to your XF86config in the appropriate place:
FontPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/artwiz"

Add this to /etc/fonts/local.conf (very important):
<dir>/usr/X11R6/lib/fonts/artwiz</dir>

From what I understand, getting the fonts to show up for different apps is a question of making the different apps and toolkits aware of those fonts, which is basically what you're doing here.

melquiades · 03-14-2004, 07:45 AM

Hi Kovacs,
haha, yours is the cool fluxbox screenshot that got me interested in it in the first place! cheers mate! Right, back to the fonts, I tried what you wrote, and again it ended up with

Code:

fc-cache: "/usr/X11R6/lib/fonts/artwiz/": caching, 5 fonts, 0 dirs

and still I can't seem to access them - could you let me know of a program and/or dialog screen that you normally can see them in the font list? As you said I think it depends on which system/binding the app was programmed in, for example, I would imagine they should show up in the GKrellm font selector if they're available - at the minute I just keep trying all the font dialogs from loads of apps to see if I can see them but still no avail. Where can you see them on yours?
Amongst my google searching I came across a guy with a similar problem, he found that he couldn't access fixed-width fonts afetr compiling gnome 2.2.1, apparantly he says that the 'fontconfig' boys may have dropped support for fixed-width fonts? Is this right (surely not!) and could it be a factor in my troubles. FYI I am running a default (full) 9.1 installation with dropline gnome installed on top. Fluxbox is 0.9.8 - other than very little changes 'coz it's all afresh install from just a few days ago

He managed to get them working 'coz his were GZip'd so in extracted them then they worked. Well mine aint GZip'd so no luck there!

Any further ideas? This is truly wierd!

thanks, Mlqds

melquiades · 03-14-2004, 08:25 AM

HAHA! Solved it! Using the 'probably-shouldn't-work-but-hell-I'll-give-it-a-try-anyway' technique I put GZip'd versions of the fonts into the directory and now everything is great! can access the fonts just like any others, free to use 'em anywhere! Yipee! On with the Fluxbox customisation weekend!
Thanks very much for your help Kovacs, it's very much appreciated - and thanks also for the inspiring screenshot!
Cheers!