[gentoo-user] Fontconfig messed up my fonts

[gentoo-user] Fontconfig messed up my fonts

[Yuri K. Shatroff]

Hello gentoo users,

Today I updated my system, including fontconfig from 2.9.0 to the latest 
unstable 2.10.2, and after reboot I was quite unhappy to see all my 
fonts become ugly, well, can't describe exactly, kind of as if back in 
1980s. (not that antialiasing disappeared or bad hinting, it was just 
the fonts being ugly -- a well antialiased, hi-res crap)
I don't know the reason, but I don't think the problem was in the 
/etc/fonts/conf.d settings, at least I didn't notice major changes after 
the update (using diff). And all the stuff like lcdfilter remained enabled.
I didn't have any special settings, neither in /etc/fonts/conf.d, nor in 
my home dir or elsewhere, because I really enjoyed the default rendering 
style.
So after all I downgraded fontconfig and the fonts' rendering is 
restored and now I enjoy it again, so I deem the issue to be the problem 
of the fontconfig-2.10.2 package. Regardless of whether it's 
configuration- or library-related, with the latter more likely, one 
wouldn't like package updates to break existing setups.
P.S. I've just thought it could be fonts cache which I noticed to 
contain entries as old as September, but if the new package can not work 
with old cache, I believe its ebuild should clear it, shouldn't it?


-- 
Best wishes,
Yuri K. Shatroff

Re: [gentoo-user] Fontconfig messed up my fonts

[Alan McKinnon]

On 04/03/2013 22:48, Yuri K. Shatroff wrote:
> Hello gentoo users,
> 
> Today I updated my system, including fontconfig from 2.9.0 to the latest
> unstable 2.10.2, and after reboot I was quite unhappy to see all my
> fonts become ugly, well, can't describe exactly, kind of as if back in
> 1980s. (not that antialiasing disappeared or bad hinting, it was just
> the fonts being ugly -- a well antialiased, hi-res crap)
> I don't know the reason, but I don't think the problem was in the
> /etc/fonts/conf.d settings, at least I didn't notice major changes after
> the update (using diff). And all the stuff like lcdfilter remained enabled.
> I didn't have any special settings, neither in /etc/fonts/conf.d, nor in
> my home dir or elsewhere, because I really enjoyed the default rendering
> style.
> So after all I downgraded fontconfig and the fonts' rendering is
> restored and now I enjoy it again, so I deem the issue to be the problem
> of the fontconfig-2.10.2 package. Regardless of whether it's
> configuration- or library-related, with the latter more likely, one
> wouldn't like package updates to break existing setups.
> P.S. I've just thought it could be fonts cache which I noticed to
> contain entries as old as September, but if the new package can not work
> with old cache, I believe its ebuild should clear it, shouldn't it?

Well, it's probably not fontconfig, it's more likely the GUI software
you use that has issues.

fontconfig-2.10.2 is fine here with KDE-4.10 apps and most of Mozilla's
stuff.

What GUI software do you run that has issues? And is it ALL apps, or
just a few you use often and might notice it more?


-- 
Alan McKinnon
alan.mckinnon@gmail.com

Re: [gentoo-user] Fontconfig messed up my fonts

[Yuri K. Shatroff]

On 05.03.2013 01:39, Alan McKinnon wrote:
> On 04/03/2013 22:48, Yuri K. Shatroff wrote:
>> Hello gentoo users,
>>
>> Today I updated my system, including fontconfig from 2.9.0 to the
>> latest unstable 2.10.2, and after reboot I was quite unhappy to see
>> all my fonts become ugly, well, can't describe exactly, kind of as
>> if back in 1980s. (not that antialiasing disappeared or bad
>> hinting, it was just the fonts being ugly -- a well antialiased,
>> hi-res crap) I don't know the reason, but I don't think the problem
>> was in the /etc/fonts/conf.d settings, at least I didn't notice
>> major changes after the update (using diff). And all the stuff like
>> lcdfilter remained enabled. I didn't have any special settings,
>> neither in /etc/fonts/conf.d, nor in my home dir or elsewhere,
>> because I really enjoyed the default rendering style. So after all
>> I downgraded fontconfig and the fonts' rendering is restored and
>> now I enjoy it again, so I deem the issue to be the problem of the
>> fontconfig-2.10.2 package. Regardless of whether it's
>> configuration- or library-related, with the latter more likely,
>> one wouldn't like package updates to break existing setups. P.S.
>> I've just thought it could be fonts cache which I noticed to
>> contain entries as old as September, but if the new package can not
>> work with old cache, I believe its ebuild should clear it,
>> shouldn't it?
>
> Well, it's probably not fontconfig, it's more likely the GUI
> software you use that has issues.

It's hard to imagine a modern GUI software rendering fonts bypassing the 
font rendering engine. It's not kind of pixel-art, you know :)
And moreover, see below.

> fontconfig-2.10.2 is fine here with KDE-4.10 apps and most of
> Mozilla's stuff.

I have updated @world to unstable as of the date I was writing, incl.
latest KDE and *zillas.

> What GUI software do you run that has issues? And is it ALL apps, or
> just a few you use often and might notice it more?

Yes, it is ALL apps. That's why I almost immediately began to blame
fontconfig, and eventually downgraded it.

Again, as usual, the problem occurring with my setup is not due to occur 
with another one's, it might be the stars misaligned corrupting bytes in 
memory during compilation, or whatever, but the evident cause was 
fontconfig because otherwise I can't explain how downgrading it did help.

-- 
Best wishes,
Yuri K. Shatroff

Re: [gentoo-user] Fontconfig messed up my fonts

[Henson Sturgill]

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OK, so this is sort-of unrelated, but does have to do with font rendering:

I've been trying to only enable the most necessary use flags this time
around (it's fun), and I built my fonts without 'X' enabled. Still, I can't
see a noticeable difference when using them in urxvt. How is the X version
of a font different than its regular version -- and does that still apply
with xft fonts?

(Sorry for jumping in.)


On Wed, Mar 6, 2013 at 3:34 AM, Yuri K. Shatroff <yks-uno@yandex.ru> wrote:

> On 05.03.2013 01:39, Alan McKinnon wrote:
>
>> On 04/03/2013 22:48, Yuri K. Shatroff wrote:
>>
>>> Hello gentoo users,
>>>
>>> Today I updated my system, including fontconfig from 2.9.0 to the
>>> latest unstable 2.10.2, and after reboot I was quite unhappy to see
>>> all my fonts become ugly, well, can't describe exactly, kind of as
>>> if back in 1980s. (not that antialiasing disappeared or bad
>>> hinting, it was just the fonts being ugly -- a well antialiased,
>>> hi-res crap) I don't know the reason, but I don't think the problem
>>> was in the /etc/fonts/conf.d settings, at least I didn't notice
>>> major changes after the update (using diff). And all the stuff like
>>> lcdfilter remained enabled. I didn't have any special settings,
>>> neither in /etc/fonts/conf.d, nor in my home dir or elsewhere,
>>> because I really enjoyed the default rendering style. So after all
>>> I downgraded fontconfig and the fonts' rendering is restored and
>>> now I enjoy it again, so I deem the issue to be the problem of the
>>> fontconfig-2.10.2 package. Regardless of whether it's
>>> configuration- or library-related, with the latter more likely,
>>> one wouldn't like package updates to break existing setups. P.S.
>>> I've just thought it could be fonts cache which I noticed to
>>> contain entries as old as September, but if the new package can not
>>> work with old cache, I believe its ebuild should clear it,
>>> shouldn't it?
>>>
>>
>> Well, it's probably not fontconfig, it's more likely the GUI
>> software you use that has issues.
>>
>
> It's hard to imagine a modern GUI software rendering fonts bypassing the
> font rendering engine. It's not kind of pixel-art, you know :)
> And moreover, see below.
>
>
>  fontconfig-2.10.2 is fine here with KDE-4.10 apps and most of
>> Mozilla's stuff.
>>
>
> I have updated @world to unstable as of the date I was writing, incl.
> latest KDE and *zillas.
>
>
>  What GUI software do you run that has issues? And is it ALL apps, or
>> just a few you use often and might notice it more?
>>
>
> Yes, it is ALL apps. That's why I almost immediately began to blame
> fontconfig, and eventually downgraded it.
>
> Again, as usual, the problem occurring with my setup is not due to occur
> with another one's, it might be the stars misaligned corrupting bytes in
> memory during compilation, or whatever, but the evident cause was
> fontconfig because otherwise I can't explain how downgrading it did help.
>
>
> --
> Best wishes,
> Yuri K. Shatroff
>
>

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