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FONTS Earnestly |
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Better Defaults for Freetype |
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Contents |
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Introduction ....................................................... 16 |
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Better Defaults .................................................... 43 |
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Configuration ...................................................... 68 |
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The Infinality Ultimate Bundle ..................................... 84 |
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Additional Resources ............................................... 95 |
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Introduction |
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Historically on Linux in order to get nicely rendered fonts one would |
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need to resort to patches like Infinality, however this only applied to |
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TrueType[1] fonts. |
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In 2013 Adobe donated their CFF (Compact Font Format)[2] rasterizer to |
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the freetype project[3] which greatly boosted quality of OpenType |
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rendering. It was donated primarily for Adobe and Google's epic Noto |
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typeface[4]. |
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Freetype has since made the CFF hinting engine default in version |
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2.4.12[5]. |
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In contrast, while Infinality's ClearType implementation has been part |
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of freetype since mid 2012[6], it is not enabled by default due to |
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patent concerns[7]. |
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<[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TrueType> |
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<[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PostScript_fonts#Compact_Font_Format> |
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<[3] http://blog.typekit.com/2013/05/01/adobe-contributes-cff-rasterizer-to-freetype/> |
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<[4] http://lwn.net/Articles/613284/> |
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<[5] http://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/freetype/freetype2.git/commit/?id=06474c3e5bef> |
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<[6] http://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/freetype/freetype2.git/commit/?id=79e36baebba4> |
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<[7] http://david.freetype.org/cleartype-patents.html> |
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Better Defaults |
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The simplest method to seeing an improvement would be to use |
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freetype2-git from either the AUR[8] or heftig's repository[9]. |
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Alternatively, due to pressure from other maintainers, an Arch Linux |
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specific addition[10] has exposed the subpixel hinter via the |
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environment variable FT2_SUBPIXEL_HINTING. Setting this to anything |
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so that it present in your environ will enable the hinter. Removing |
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it will disable it. |
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The next, and perhaps obvious, requirement is to use good fonts. I |
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speak not of aesthetic quality or visual style, but the the |
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construction. Typefaces designed with good hinting instructions[11] |
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or blues values[12]. A nice collection of commerically free to use |
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fonts is currated at <http://www.fontsquirrel.com/>. Simply download |
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and copy the outlines to XDG_DATA_HOME/fonts (~/.local/share/fonts). |
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<[8] https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/freetype2-git/> |
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<[9] https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=117157> |
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<[10] https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/35274> |
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<[11] http://www.microsoft.com/typography/otspec160/ttinst.htm> |
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<[12] https://partners.adobe.com/public/developer/en/font/T1_SPEC.PDF> |
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Configuration |
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I have provided what I consider a good base-line configuration for |
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freetype via fontconfig[13]. There is minimal opinion of which can be |
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easily removed. The configuration is fairly well documented in the |
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fonts-conf(5) manual. |
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Simply place the configuration in XDG_CONFIG_HOME/fontconfig/fonts.conf |
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(~/.config/fontconfig/fonts.conf) and restart any software which loaded |
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the freetype library. |
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(Some systems do not require restarts as they update freetype settings |
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automatically such as Gnome via the gnome-settings-daemon.) |
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<[13] https://github.com/Earnestly/dotfiles/blob/master/.config/fontconfig/fonts.conf> |
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The Infinality Ultimate Bundle |
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The Infinality Ultimate Bundle[14] is a nice project which aims to |
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create a curated and tuned collection of fonts for use on free OS' such |
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as Linux. This is similar to what both Windows and OSX do for their |
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users. Use this if you are not particularly interested in typefaces |
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and simply want nice font rendering. |
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<[14] http://bohoomil.com/> |
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Additional Resources |
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* The de-facto Bible of outline hinting: <http://www.rastertragedy.com/> |
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* Behdad's excellent introduction to challenges facing high-DPI |
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displays and their relationship to current systems: <http://goo.gl/yf3M7> |
Earnestly revised this gist