[HOWTO]New freetype subpixel font rendering for lcd monitors

Message

cvig · Post by **cvig** » Wed Dec 05, 2007 7:30 pm

boniek wrote:Use freetype from portage tree - it's patched already.

Thank you. I still can't get over how easier it is to read well rendered fonts.

billydv · Post by **billydv** » Sat Dec 15, 2007 3:31 pm

I thought I had seen something about qt4 apps in this thread and the newer freetype, I am having a problem with a qt4 app named servant, after updating freetype, servants fonts look horrible.

billydv · Post by **billydv** » Sun Dec 16, 2007 5:54 pm

Also, will there be a cairo update in xeffects? There are two newer versions in portage currently.

boniek · Post by **boniek** » Sun Dec 16, 2007 9:26 pm

There is tarball with newer version of cairo on previous page. I don't know about XEffects as I don't have commit rights to tree anymore. I'm not user of qt4 so I can't help you with your problem.

billydv · Post by **billydv** » Mon Dec 17, 2007 6:06 am

I heard something about pdf rendering problems with the newer cairo version, any truth to that?

m.s.w · Post by **m.s.w** » Mon Dec 17, 2007 6:34 am

I compiled cairo using ebuild from boniek on previous page. No problems with pdf.

punkid · Post by **punkid** » Thu Dec 20, 2007 3:14 pm

The newer cairo with newspr patch has been commited into gentoo-china overlay
I'm emerging it right now

boniek · Post by **boniek** » Thu Dec 20, 2007 11:08 pm

For all this to work you will need patched cairo AND patched libXft. hopefully gentoo-china got both

punkid · Post by **punkid** » Fri Dec 21, 2007 4:11 am

boniek wrote:For all this to work you will need patched cairo AND patched libXft. hopefully gentoo-china got both

Still needs xeffects overlay to get the patched libXft, gentoo-china doesnt have it by far

billydv · Post by **billydv** » Sun Dec 23, 2007 4:49 pm

Could someone with fonts working well please compare this and let me know what if anything is different on their system

eselect fontconfig list
Available fontconfig .conf files ( * is enabled ):
[1] 10-autohint.conf *
[2] 10-no-sub-pixel.conf
[3] 10-sub-pixel-bgr.conf
[4] 10-sub-pixel-rgb.conf *
[5] 10-sub-pixel-vbgr.conf
[6] 10-sub-pixel-vrgb.conf
[7] 10-unhinted.conf
[8] 20-fix-globaladvance.conf *
[9] 20-unhint-small-vera.conf *
[10] 25-unhint-nonlatin.conf
[11] 30-metric-aliases.conf *
[12] 30-urw-aliases.conf *
[13] 40-nonlatin.conf *
[14] 45-latin.conf *
[15] 49-sansserif.conf *
[16] 50-user.conf *
[17] 51-local.conf *
[18] 60-latin.conf *
[19] 60-liberation.conf *
[20] 65-fonts-persian.conf *
[21] 65-nonlatin.conf *
[22] 69-unifont.conf *
[23] 70-no-bitmaps.conf
[24] 70-yes-bitmaps.conf *
[25] 80-delicious.conf *
[26] 90-synthetic.conf *

boniek · Post by **boniek** » Sun Dec 23, 2007 9:22 pm

Code: Select all

> eselect fontconfig list
Available fontconfig .conf files ( * is enabled ):
  [1]   10-autohint.conf
  [2]   10-no-sub-pixel.conf
  [3]   10-sub-pixel-bgr.conf
  [4]   10-sub-pixel-rgb.conf
  [5]   10-sub-pixel-vbgr.conf
  [6]   10-sub-pixel-vrgb.conf
  [7]   10-unhinted.conf
  [8]   20-fix-globaladvance.conf *
  [9]   20-lohit-gujarati.conf
  [10]  20-unhint-small-dejavu.conf
  [11]  20-unhint-small-dejavu-experimental.conf
  [12]  20-unhint-small-vera.conf *
  [13]  25-unhint-nonlatin.conf
  [14]  30-amt-aliases.conf
  [15]  30-metric-aliases.conf *
  [16]  30-urw-aliases.conf *
  [17]  40-generic.conf
  [18]  40-nonlatin.conf *
  [19]  45-latin.conf *
  [20]  49-sansserif.conf *
  [21]  50-user.conf *
  [22]  51-local.conf *
  [23]  57-dejavu.conf
  [24]  59-dejavu.conf
  [25]  60-latin.conf *
  [26]  60-liberation.conf
  [27]  61-dejavu-experimental.conf
  [28]  65-fonts-persian.conf *
  [29]  65-nonlatin.conf *
  [30]  69-unifont.conf *
  [31]  70-no-bitmaps.conf
  [32]  70-yes-bitmaps.conf
  [33]  80-delicious.conf *
  [34]  90-synthetic.conf *

BTW I'm Gnome user.

billydv · Post by **billydv** » Sun Dec 23, 2007 10:25 pm

I have made a couple of changes overall. After changing all my kde fonts to verdana 13 with the exception of fixed width which is set to Dejavu sans mono 13, I set firefox and konqueror both to use verdana. Then my final eselect fontconfig was this

Available fontconfig .conf files ( * is enabled ):
[1] 10-autohint.conf *
[2] 10-no-sub-pixel.conf
[3] 10-sub-pixel-bgr.conf
[4] 10-sub-pixel-rgb.conf *
[5] 10-sub-pixel-vbgr.conf
[6] 10-sub-pixel-vrgb.conf
[7] 10-unhinted.conf
[8] 20-fix-globaladvance.conf *
[9] 20-unhint-small-vera.conf *
[10] 25-unhint-nonlatin.conf
[11] 30-metric-aliases.conf *
[12] 30-urw-aliases.conf *
[13] 40-nonlatin.conf *
[14] 45-latin.conf *
[15] 49-sansserif.conf *
[16] 50-user.conf *
[17] 51-local.conf *
[18] 60-latin.conf *
[19] 60-liberation.conf *
[20] 65-fonts-persian.conf *
[21] 65-nonlatin.conf *
[22] 69-unifont.conf *
[23] 70-no-bitmaps.conf
[24] 70-yes-bitmaps.conf *
[25] 80-delicious.conf *
[26] 90-synthetic.conf *

and my .fonts.conf was left at

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<!DOCTYPE fontconfig SYSTEM "fonts.dtd">
<fontconfig>
<match target="font" >
<edit mode="assign" name="rgba" >
<const>rgb</const>
</edit>
</match>
<match target="font" >
<edit mode="assign" name="hinting" >
<bool>true</bool>
</edit>
</match>
<match target="font" >
<edit mode="assign" name="hintstyle" >
<const>hintmedium</const>
</edit>
</match>
<match target="font" >
<edit mode="assign" name="antialias" >
<bool>true</bool>
</edit>
</match>
<match target="font">
<edit mode="assign" name="autohint">
<bool>true</bool>
</edit>
</match>
</fontconfig>

This setup gives me reasonably good font rendering. Still qt4 apps don't render real well but what can I say. I'm not sure there is a real solution.

bluesurfer · Post by **bluesurfer** » Thu Dec 27, 2007 10:42 pm

I use the cairo-1.4.12 ebuild from gentoo-china and libXft-2.1.12 from xeffects overlay. Looks great!
What about the quantization patch for freetype - why do I not need it?

BTW I think the ubuntu guys have already implemeted the patches in gutsy according to this:
http://wiki.ubuntuusers.de/Schriftbild_verbessern
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=555964

natros · Post by **natros** » Sat Dec 29, 2007 10:51 am

bluesurfer wrote:I use the cairo-1.4.12 ebuild from gentoo-china and libXft-2.1.12 from xeffects overlay. Looks great!
What about the quantization patch for freetype - why do I not need it?

BTW I think the ubuntu guys have already implemeted the patches in gutsy according to this:
http://wiki.ubuntuusers.de/Schriftbild_verbessern
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=555964

That's true.

PaulBredbury · Post by **PaulBredbury** » Sat Dec 29, 2007 3:34 pm

Hooray, Ubuntu's patches look great

Better than xeffects, I think.

paladin-zero · Post by **paladin-zero** » Sat Dec 29, 2007 9:33 pm

billydv wrote:I thought I had seen something about qt4 apps in this thread and the newer freetype, I am having a problem with a qt4 app named servant, after updating freetype, servants fonts look horrible.

I saw the same problem. Try running qtconfig, and change your default fonts.

paladin-zero · Post by **paladin-zero** » Sat Dec 29, 2007 9:42 pm

punkid wrote:The newer cairo with newspr patch has been commited into gentoo-china overlay
I'm emerging it right now

A few posts to this thread in October claimed that the xeffects project is still alive, but the overlay is not being updated to keep pace with portage. Now people are using gentoo-china instead of xeffects to provide the ebuilds? Is somebody actively maintaining the xeffects overlay?

billydv · Post by **billydv** » Sun Dec 30, 2007 1:56 am

That did it, changed my font to verdana in qtconfig and now it shows up beautiful.

neuron · Post by **neuron** » Sun Dec 30, 2007 11:33 am

PaulBredbury wrote:Hooray, Ubuntu's patches look great

Better than xeffects, I think.

This might make it into gentoo's main tree as well then I guess, since ubuntu is quite paranoid about license problems and stuff like that there shouldn't be any problems with those patches.

swimmer · Post by **swimmer** » Sun Dec 30, 2007 1:40 pm

Hmm - are there already ebuilds available to test this stuff? Or do I need to patch it manually?

Since xeffects seems to be unmaintained I have to look for another solution to keep those great looking fonts :-/

Greetz
swimmer

elkhunter · Post by **elkhunter** » Mon Dec 31, 2007 12:56 am

Is this howto still accurate? Should I emerge xeffects or gentoo-china and what USE flags are needed (I saw posts indicating to use newspr and one indicated to use filter_* instead). Also, what should I put in /etc/fonts/local.conf and in ~/.fonts.conf and what fontconfig scripts do I want enabled for an LCD (RGB) monitor? Any help appreciated.

mwhitlock · Post by **mwhitlock** » Tue Jan 01, 2008 10:36 am

elkhunter wrote:Is this howto still accurate? Should I emerge xeffects or gentoo-china and what USE flags are needed (I saw posts indicating to use newspr and one indicated to use filter_* instead). Also, what should I put in /etc/fonts/local.conf and in ~/.fonts.conf and what fontconfig scripts do I want enabled for an LCD (RGB) monitor? Any help appreciated.

I had to pull both xeffects and gentoo-china in order to get patched libXft-2.1.12 and cairo-1.4.12, respectively. I used Layman to get the xeffects overlay, but gentoo-china isn't listed in it, so I had to check that one out manually.

Additionally, because xeffects doesn't have kdelibs-3.5.8-r2 yet (c'mon guys!), I had to make my own:

Code: Select all

# cp /usr/portage/kde-base/kdelibs/kdelibs-3.5.8-r2.ebuild /usr/local/portage/layman/xeffects/kde-base/kdelibs/
# diff -u /usr/portage/kde-base/kdelibs/kdelibs-3.5.8-r1.ebuild \
        /usr/local/portage/layman/xeffects/kde-base/kdelibs/kdelibs-3.5.8-r1.ebuild |
        patch /usr/local/portage/layman/xeffects/kde-base/kdelibs/kdelibs-3.5.8-r2.ebuild
# ebuild /usr/local/portage/layman/xeffects/kde-base/kdelibs/kdelibs-3.5.8-r2.ebuild manifest

Here's my ~/.fonts.conf, with commentary:

Code: Select all

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<!DOCTYPE fontconfig SYSTEM "fonts.dtd">
<fontconfig>

 <!-- Enable sub-pixel anti-aliasing -->
 <match target="font" >
  <edit mode="assign" name="rgba" >
   <const>rgb</const>
  </edit>
 </match>
 <match target="font" >
  <edit mode="assign" name="antialias" >
   <bool>true</bool>
  </edit>
 </match>

 <!-- Disable hinting (I like Mac-ish fonts) -->
 <match target="font" >
  <edit mode="assign" name="hinting" >
   <bool>false</bool>
  </edit>
 </match>
 <match target="font" >
  <edit mode="assign" name="hintstyle" >
   <const>hintnone</const>
  </edit>
 </match>

 <!-- Ban bitmap fonts (yuck!) -->
 <include>/etc/fonts/conf.avail/70-no-bitmaps.conf</include>

 <!-- Enable hinting for DejaVu Sans Mono, my terminal font -->
 <match target="font">
  <test name="family">
   <string>DejaVu Sans Mono</string>
  </test>
  <edit mode="assign" name="hinting">
   <bool>true</bool>
  </edit>
  <edit mode="assign" name="hintstyle">
   <const>hintfull</const>
  </edit>
 </match>

 <!-- Ban Type-1 fonts because they render poorly -->
 <selectfont>
  <rejectfont>
   <pattern>
    <patelt name="fontformat" >
     <string>Type 1</string>
    </patelt>
   </pattern>
  </rejectfont>
 </selectfont>

</fontconfig>

mwhitlock · Post by **mwhitlock** » Tue Jan 01, 2008 11:32 am

I have to say, my fonts look really freakin' good now, IMHO.

Screen shot:
http://img146.imageshack.us/img146/1892 ... hotvf2.png

In looking through this thread, I see a lot of posts saying that bold fonts are "too bold." Could someone comment on my screen shot? Bold fonts look totally correct to me. (For example, look at the selected window button in the Kicker.)

Incidentally, to clear up the apparent confusion out there:

fontconfig : merely selects a font file according to some given attributes; does no rasterization or rendering!
freetype : rasterizes vector font glyphs into bitmaps; does no LCD filtering!
libXft : renders glyph bitmaps on an X display; performs LCD filtering
cairo : renders vector graphics and FreeType-rasterized text; also performs LCD filtering

PaulBredbury · Post by **PaulBredbury** » Tue Jan 01, 2008 12:00 pm

fontconfig-ubuntu is required, to compile cairo-ubuntu. Otherwise:

Code: Select all

cairo-xlib-screen.c:191: error: 'FC_LCD_FILTER_DEFAULT' undeclared
cairo-xlib-screen.c:234: error: 'FC_LCD_FILTER_NONE' undeclared
cairo-xlib-screen.c:237: error: 'FC_LCD_FILTER_LIGHT' undeclared
cairo-xlib-screen.c:240: error: 'FC_LCD_FILTER_LEGACY' undeclared

bluesurfer · Post by **bluesurfer** » Tue Jan 01, 2008 1:45 pm

mwhitlock wrote:I had to pull both xeffects and gentoo-china in order to get patched libXft-2.1.12 and cairo-1.4.12, respectively. I used Layman to get the xeffects overlay, but gentoo-china isn't listed in it, so I had to check that one out manually.

Strange. gentoo-china is in layman on my system.

mwhitlock wrote:Additionally, because xeffects doesn't have kdelibs-3.5.8-r2 yet (c'mon guys!), I had to make my own:

Why do you want kdelibs from xeffects? There's no need to if you just want to have better rendered fonts.