TIP: The simplest way to add fonts to your system

The_Saint · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 15 Mar 2004 Posts: 108

Just copy your *.ttf file(s) to /usr/share/fonts/local
Most probably, the next time you will use the OOo Writer the new fonts will be available.

If not, then add the line
FontPath "/usr/share/fonts/local/"
to your /etc/X11/xorg.conf file.

plbe · l33t Joined: 01 May 2004 Posts: 661

Why not just add them to /usr/share/fonts/TTF/ ?

The_Saint · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 15 Mar 2004 Posts: 108

Yes, I suppose you could do it, but I am not sure if the contents of /usr/share/fonts/TTF/ will be overwritten the next time you update your system. The local directory stays intact.

oksutin · Posted: Mon Sep 05, 2005 4:46 pm Post subject:

If you are the only one using the system (as I am), then the simplest way is to copy the fonts to ~/.fonts. It's not system-wide, but is enough for a single-user system.

i92guboj · Posted: Mon Sep 05, 2005 5:55 pm Post subject:

You can put the fonts in any dir of your choice. It will be system wide if it appears in your xorg.conf. And will be a single user font if you install it in ~/.fonts (modifiable in ~/.fonts.conf)

The only limitations:

1.- If you install a font into any font path that is a system default in gentoo, make sure that you do not overwrite any other font that is called the same. That will end also in a re-overwritting next time you emerge the old font. If you dont want this trouble, install your custom fonts into /usr/local/fonts or into any other directory does not matter if it is called /usr/custom/fonts/, /JohnnyMelonic.fonts/ or /Alittle-rainbow.tipografies/.

2.- Make sure that the custom fonts (if installed globally) appear in xorg.conf above any others. The reason: some fonts do have the same name, and xorg will use the first font with the given name that it is able to find. So, putting first your custom fonts you make sure that they will take precedence over any other, in case that you have different fonts with the same names in different paths.

r00t440 · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 14 Sep 2005 Posts: 93

ok I have tons of fonts in my Windows and I want to use them under Gentoo, I've tried everything but it seemed so impossible to get it working. I can say that somehow, I have "partly" succedeed in making it work because at least I can make my custom fonts be listed in Gnome's "Font Preferences" but unfortunately Gnome or X won't render my font. So where's the "success" part? Fortunately, I can view and use my custom fonts in OpenOffice2 but they seem to be sooo ugly - antialiasing don't work well on some fonts in OO2. So here are my questions I hope somebody can enlighten me:

1 What is the maximum number of installable fonts in xorg? If there is... (I have around 3K fonts)
2 How do I check a TTF font if it is broken? (all the TTF fonts I used worked well in Windows and they also worked in OO2)
3 Will XFS (x font server) help? Xfs is masked in portage, is this new? AFAIK xfs has been around for quite a long time already.

Here are my analysis with regards to installing fonts...

fc-cache adds all the fonts in X eventhough you did not specified the font path in xorg.conf as long as you've placed it in /usr/share/fonts (any dir).

I wonder what's the use of mkfontdir and mkfontscale.... (i think they're already deprecated)

By the way here are some info about my gentoo box:

kernel: 2.6.13-gentoo-r2
xorg: xorg-x11-6.8.2-r4
gnome: gnome-light-2.10
cpu: athlon xp 1700+

Oh... has anyone tried ldflags? My box is kind of speedier...