Making non-antialiased fonts looks nice.

Franklin · 02-12-2005, 02:33 PM

Being home sick (again) today and evidently being a glutton for punishment, I decided to give Ubuntu a try.

The procedure I laid out works fine with a couple of additions/changes that might be of importance.

1. The initial install does not come with g++ or gcc, so:

apt-get install g++
apt-get install gcc

2. Create a directory for the new fonts:

mkdir /usr/local/share/fonts/TTF

3. Copy truetype fonts to the new directory.

4. Run fc-cache

5. Create a path to the fonts in /etc/X11/XF86Config-4

Code:

Section "Files"
	#FontPath	"unix/:7100"			# local font server     <------LOOK
	# if the local font server has problems, we can fall back on these
	FontPath	"/usr/lib/X11/fonts/misc"
	FontPath	"/usr/lib/X11/fonts/cyrillic"
	FontPath        "/usr/local/share/fonts/TTF"                <-------LOOK
        FontPath	"/usr/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi/:unscaled"
	FontPath	"/usr/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi/:unscaled"
	FontPath	"/usr/lib/X11/fonts/Type1"
	FontPath	"/usr/lib/X11/fonts/CID"
	FontPath	"/usr/lib/X11/fonts/Speedo"
	FontPath	"/usr/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi"
	FontPath	"/usr/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi"
        
        # paths to defoma fonts
	FontPath	"/var/lib/defoma/x-ttcidfont-conf.d/dirs/TrueType"
	FontPath	"/var/lib/defoma/x-ttcidfont-conf.d/dirs/CID"
EndSection

Note that I commented out the line that referrences the local font server. It wasn't loading correctly anyway.

6. Compile freetype-2.1.9 with the bytecode interpreter enabled

./configure --prefix=/usr
make
make install (I loaded a root console here rather than using sudo)

7. Run ldconfig (probably not needed since I rebooted after all this anyway - but good practice)

7a. Check symlinks:

Code:

test2@peggyo:~ $ cd /usr/lib
test2@peggyo:/usr/lib $ ls -la libfreetype*
-rw-r--r--    1 root     root      2465242 2005-02-12 14:05 libfreetype.a
-rwxr-xr-x    1 root     root          812 2005-02-12 14:05 libfreetype.la
lrwxrwxrwx    1 root     root           20 2005-02-12 14:05 libfreetype.so -> libfreetype.so.6.3.7
lrwxrwxrwx    1 root     root           20 2005-02-12 14:05 libfreetype.so.6 -> libfreetype.so.6.3.7
-rw-r--r--    1 root     root       430824 2004-08-12 20:48 libfreetype.so.6.3.5
-rwxr-xr-x    1 root     root      1549131 2005-02-12 14:05 libfreetype.so.6.3.7
test2@peggyo:/usr/lib $

8. Reboot

9. Desktop Preferences - Fonts
Font Rendering = Monochrome
Smoothing = None
Hinting = Full

10. Replace Sans Font with Arial, Verdana, or Tahoma as the Application and Desktop font. I used Verdana at 8 point. Of course you can do what you want here.

Thats it I think.
This should work with Debian too.

Good luck and have fun!

jinacio · 02-13-2005, 02:37 PM

i think i see a problem

don't think i disabled the local font server ("unix/:7100")...

as soon as i have a chance i'll try it out... if not i think i'll guive up for now (checked everything else at least twice...)

Anyway, thanks a lot for your help!

update:
that, and deleting a bad ~/.fonts.conf seemed to do the trick

all i need to do now is play arround with different font settings to make everything look great
(ff fonts still look a bit square).

Cheers,
João Inácio

BTW: how's that HOWTO comming up?

newinlinux · 02-25-2005, 10:35 AM

Hi all,
Need your advise on how to resolve this error during ./configure

root@slackbox:/home/brian/freetype-2.1.9# ./configure --prefix=/usr
cd builds/unix; ./configure --prefix=/usr
checking build system type... i686-pc-linux-gnu
checking host system type... i686-pc-linux-gnu
checking target system type... i686-pc-linux-gnu
checking for gcc... gcc
checking for C compiler default output file name... a.out
checking whether the C compiler works... yes
checking whether we are cross compiling... no
checking for suffix of executables...
checking for suffix of object files... o
checking whether we are using the GNU C compiler... yes
checking whether gcc accepts -g... yes
checking for gcc option to accept ANSI C... none needed
checking how to run the C preprocessor... /lib/cpp
configure: error: C preprocessor "/lib/cpp" fails sanity check
See `config.log' for more details.
make: *** [builds/unix/unix-def.mk] Error 1

Anyone knows how can i solve this issue? I checked, cpp is part of gcc, i have that instaled, and I have made my own kernel(2.6.10).

I did a full installed from Slackware 10.1.

Advance thanks.

Franklin · 02-25-2005, 11:59 AM

Read to the bottom of this thread:

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...hreadid=288348

lacerto · 03-01-2005, 07:02 AM

Yet another happy customer here. Thanks.
L

newinlinux · 03-01-2005, 07:09 PM

Franklin, thanks for the direction given, i havemy freetype compiled and installed. Strangely i didnt see much difference from the stock installation of my Slackware 10.1 though. Mybe it's my eyes.

One funny thing is that i must have my kernel-headers-2.4 installed then i can compile the sources, but i am using a 2.6.10 from kernel.org, i thought everything should be there already, why need a 2.4 headers when i am compiling from my 2.6.10? I will read up more on this.

Thanks again.

Dragec · 03-02-2005, 12:26 PM

WOW!!!

This is some excellent stuff!!

Thank you, thank you, thank you.....

Deeze · 03-04-2005, 09:18 AM

Maybe I just don't "get it", but but in all the shots I've seen that people say is "better" I see a bunch of jaggy fonts. Not to mention the kerning is too close for my taste. Guess that style is just not for me. Feel free to try to enlighten me, I'm always up for learning something new. I certainly don't see my fonts as "blurry", then again I may be blind to something you guys see.

omlette · 03-06-2005, 10:15 AM

Everything seemingly works fine (tons of errors on compile, but most seem to be the one you mentioned woult happen), up until I reach the "make install" part of FreeType2.

Code:

debian:/home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/src# make install
/home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/builds/unix/mkinstalldirs /usr/lib                     \
                         /usr/lib/pkgconfig                       \
                         /usr/include/freetype2/freetype/config   \
                         /usr/include/freetype2/freetype/internal \
                         /usr/include/freetype2/freetype/cache    \
                         /usr/bin                                 \
                         /usr/share/aclocal
/home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/src/libtool --mode=install /usr/bin/install -c \
                                  /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/src/libfreetype.la /usr/lib
/usr/bin/install -c /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/src/.libs/libfreetype.so.6.3.6 /usr/lib/libfreetype.so.6.3.6
(cd /usr/lib && rm -f libfreetype.so.6 && ln -s libfreetype.so.6.3.6 libfreetype.so.6)
(cd /usr/lib && rm -f libfreetype.so && ln -s libfreetype.so.6.3.6 libfreetype.so)
/usr/bin/install -c /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/src/.libs/libfreetype.lai /usr/lib/libfreetype.la
/usr/bin/install -c /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/src/.libs/libfreetype.a /usr/lib/libfreetype.a
ranlib /usr/lib/libfreetype.a
chmod 644 /usr/lib/libfreetype.a
PATH="$PATH:/sbin" ldconfig -n /usr/lib
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Libraries have been installed in:
   /usr/lib

If you ever happen to want to link against installed libraries
in a given directory, LIBDIR, you must either use libtool, and
specify the full pathname of the library, or use the `-LLIBDIR'
flag during linking and do at least one of the following:
   - add LIBDIR to the `LD_LIBRARY_PATH' environment variable
     during execution
   - add LIBDIR to the `LD_RUN_PATH' environment variable
     during linking
   - use the `-Wl,--rpath -Wl,LIBDIR' linker flag
   - have your system administrator add LIBDIR to `/etc/ld.so.conf'

See any operating system documentation about shared libraries for
more information, such as the ld(1) and ld.so(8) manual pages.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
for P in /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/freetype.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftbbox.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftbdf.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftcache.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftchapters.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/fterrdef.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/fterrors.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftglyph.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftgzip.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftimage.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftincrem.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftlist.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftlzw.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftmac.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftmm.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftmodapi.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftmoderr.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftoutln.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftpfr.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftrender.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftsizes.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftsnames.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftstroke.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftsynth.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftsysio.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftsysmem.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftsystem.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/fttrigon.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/fttypes.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftwinfnt.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ftxf86.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/t1tables.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ttnameid.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/tttables.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/tttags.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/ttunpat.h ; do                           \
          /usr/bin/install -c -m 644                                    \
            $P /usr/include/freetype2/freetype ; \
        done
for P in /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/autohint.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/ftcalc.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/ftdebug.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/ftdriver.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/ftgloadr.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/ftmemory.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/ftobjs.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/ftrfork.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/ftserv.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/ftstream.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/fttrace.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/internal.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/pcftypes.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/psaux.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/pshints.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/sfnt.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/t1types.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/tttypes.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/services/svbdf.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/services/svgldict.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/services/svmm.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/services/svpfr.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/services/svpostnm.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/services/svpscmap.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/services/svpsinfo.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/services/svsfnt.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/services/svttcmap.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/services/svwinfnt.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/internal/services/svxf86nm.h ; do                                      \
          /usr/bin/install -c -m 644                                             \
            $P /usr/include/freetype2/freetype/internal ; \
        done
for P in /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/config/ftconfig.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/config/ftheader.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/config/ftmodule.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/config/ftoption.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/config/ftstdlib.h  ; do                                  \
          /usr/bin/install -c -m 644                                           \
            $P /usr/include/freetype2/freetype/config ; \
        done
for P in /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/cache/ftccache.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/cache/ftccmap.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/cache/ftcglyph.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/cache/ftcimage.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/cache/ftcmanag.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/cache/ftcmru.h /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/include/freetype/cache/ftcsbits.h ; do                                  \
          /usr/bin/install -c -m 644                                          \
            $P /usr/include/freetype2/freetype/cache ; \
        done
/usr/bin/install -c -m 644 /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/builds/unix/ft2unix.h \
          /usr/include/ft2build.h
/usr/bin/install -c -m 644 /home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/builds/unix/ftconfig.h \
          /usr/include/freetype2/freetype/config/ftconfig.h
/usr/bin/install: cannot stat `/home/omlette/Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/builds/unix/ftconfig.h': No such file or directory
make: *** [install] Error 1

What's wrong? I really want to fix my fonts!

sys7em · 03-06-2005, 10:29 AM

You have to be root in order to do make install .....

omlette · 03-06-2005, 11:50 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by sys7em
You have to be root in order to do make install .....

I switch to root before make install.

Franklin · 03-06-2005, 01:58 PM

Quote:

Desktop/freetype-2.1.8/src# make install

You appear to be running make_install from the wrong directory.
Don't run it from /freetype-2.1.8/src. You run it from /freetype-2.1.8.

omlette · 03-06-2005, 03:29 PM

Ok, now "make install" seems to run without any problems, but "ldconfig" does nothing.

EDIT: I guess that's what it is supposed to do? I'll reboot and see if anything looks different.

EDIT 2: I'm very disappointed to say that fonts look absolutely the same. Is there a way to check if I did something wrong? I followed all of your instructions for the freetype2 stuff exactly and had no unexpected errors, skipping the previous because I already had truetype fonts and a 96dpi. I really wish I could just get this over with and have normal looking fonts!

ssobeht · 03-08-2005, 05:15 AM

Hi, i had some problems doing this under debian but this is how i did it all:

1 - Get the MS fonts

Add the contrib repositories and then do:

Code:

apt-get install msttcorefonts

Install also the suggested packages. If you want more truetype fonts copy them to "/usr/share/fonts/TrueType"

2 - Add bytecode rendering

Recompile FreeType2 as explained in the howto. then run:

Code:

dpkg-reconfigure fontconf

and select Bytecode rendering.

3 - Modify the xf86config file

Do what the howto said about adding the font paths. Then in the monitor section add to set the DPI

Code:

DisplaySize X Y

The formula given in the howto is wrong. Use this
X = screen-res-x * 25.4 / desired-dpi
Y = screen-res-y * 25.4 / desired-dpi

Hope this helped to anyone having problems using Debian (like me

)

MSIS · 03-11-2005, 12:16 AM

G'day all,

Just wondering if anyone else has had a problem with the gnome-terminal fonts still being anti-aliased? I've tried changing to different fonts for the terminal from the Desktop Preferences\Font menu but even though the font changes they are still anti-aliased. Another thing with gnome-termial is that characters such as the '@' symbol and when the letters 'm' and 's' are close together don't display properly with fonts such as arial (ie the symbols overlap each other and stuff). Apart from these gnome-terminal issues it has worked perfectly.

Distro = Slackware 10.1, Kernel 2.4.29

Screenshot: http://jquirke.com/1s/MSIS/screenshot.png

Just curious whether this happened to anyone else.

Cheers,

Craig Thornton.