tlug: X and fonts

["Stephen J. Turnbull" <turnbull@example.com>]

>>>>> "Neil" == Neil Booth <NeilB@example.com> writes:

    Neil> As you people know, I'm new to Linux (indeed any non-MS O/S)
    Neil> and well, my fonts are really ugly. I've got RH 5.1, and the
    Neil> default fonts under Netscape are Adobe XYZ and indescribably
    Neil> inferior to those in Windows.  Is this the wonder of Apple's
    Neil> TT font technology?

No, good fonts are expensive.  The ones you're looking at in Linux are 
contributed by Adobe and others to the X Consortium.  The good ones
they sell....

    Neil> Anyway, I'm trying to learn so much I don't have time to
    Neil> worry about fonts at present. Could someone give me a quick
    Neil> pointer how to improve the fonts / where to get them / what
    Neil> config files to amend?

For Netscape, try Edit | Preference | Appearance | Fonts.

To find out what fonts aren't unbearably ugly, run `xfontsel &' from
the command line.  When you find one you like, set the matching
family, foundry (vendor), and registry (language) in Netcape.  I
strongly recommend _not_ setting the "allow scaling" parameter, it
doesn't mean what you might guess; it's giving X license to _maximize_ 
ugliness.

No promises as to whether you'll actually _get_ the nice looking font
you see because there are some gotchas in the way X sets things up,
but you should be able to find something....  If you don't get what
you think you're seeing in xfontsel, or if you really really can't
stand anything, send us the output from `xset q' (in particular, the
font path), and we'll try the next line of attack.

-- 
University of Tsukuba                Tennodai 1-1-1 Tsukuba 305-8573 JAPAN
Institute of Policy and Planning Sciences        Tel/fax: +1 (298) 53-5091
__________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
What are those two straight lines for?  "Free software rules."
---------------------------------------------------------------
Next Nomikai: 20 November, 19:30 Tengu TokyoEkiMae 03-3275-3691
Next Meeting: 12 December, 12:30 Tokyo Station Yaesu central gate
---------------------------------------------------------------
Sponsor: PHT, makers of TurboLinux http://www.pht.co.jp