[gentoo-user] font problems after following instructions in gentoo wiki

[Allan Gottlieb]

Summary: After following the instructions in the Xorg and fonts wiki
the default firefox font is awful (the combination "at" especially).
Workaround is simple; should I file a bug or have I erred?

Details:

I followed basically all the instructions in the Xorg and fonts gentoo
wiki (my files are given below) including those for firefox (I don't
use thunderbird).  The default serif font settings for firefox in the
wiki are Bitstream Vera Serif at 16 pixels.  With this default font
and size many pages look awful.  Specifically, the letter "t" seems to
be too far left and for sure the combination "at" is partially
superimposed.  For example, viewing http://cs.nyu.edu/~gottlieb with
this font and size is bad.

If I change the size to 15 or 17 or change the font to say century
schoolbook L (with size 16), the problem disappears.

Have I messed up the settings or should I fill a bug?  If the latter,
where is the appropriate bug site for this?

thanks,
allan

================ /etc/fonts/local.conf ================

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<!DOCTYPE fontconfig SYSTEM "fonts.dtd">
<!-- /etc/fonts/local.conf file for local customizations -->

<!-- AJG: Changes by allan following the gentoo wiki -->

<fontconfig>

<!--  Enable sub-pixel rendering -->
	<match target="font">
		<test qual="all" name="rgba">
			<const>unknown</const>
		</test>
		<edit name="rgba" mode="assign"><const>rgb</const></edit>
	</match>


<!-- Use the Autohinter -->

	<match target="font">
		<edit name="autohint" mode="assign"><bool>true</bool></edit>
	</match>

<!-- Disable Autohinting for bold fonts -->

	<match target="font">
		<test name="weight" compare="more">
			<const>medium</const>
		</test>
		<edit name="autohint" mode="assign"><bool>false</bool></edit>
	</match>

<!-- Exclude/Include a range of fonts for Anti Aliasing -->



<!-- See wiki for what this is and why it is commented out -->
<!--

 <match target="font">
	<test qual="any" name="size" compare="more">
		 <double>9</double>
	 </test>
	 <test qual="any" name="size" compare="less">
		 <double>14</double>
	 </test>
	 <edit name="antialias" mode="assign">
		 <bool>true</bool>
	 </edit>
 </match>

-->

<!-- Use this if you have some fonts in a nonstandard directory -->
<!--

	 <dir>/home/david/extrafonts</dir>

-->

</fontconfig>

<!-- Local Variables: -->
<!-- mode: sgml -->
<!-- End: -->

================ /etc/X11/xorg.conf ================

[snip]

# DisplaySize (in mm) important for fonts (so says gentoo font wiki)

    DisplaySize 409 307

[snip]

# Multiple FontPath entries are allowed (which are concatenated together),
# as well as specifying multiple comma-separated entries in one FontPath
# command (or a combination of both methods)

    # For XFS, uncomment this and comment the others
    # FontPath	"unix/:-1"
    FontPath	"/usr/share/fonts/misc:unscaled"
    FontPath	"/usr/share/fonts/Type1"
    FontPath    "/usr/share/fonts/TTF"
    FontPath    "/usr/share/fonts/corefonts"
    FontPath    "/usr/share/fonts/freefont"
    FontPath    "/usr/share/fonts/sharefonts"
    FontPath    "/usr/share/fonts/terminus"
    FontPath    "/usr/share/fonts/ttf-bitstream-vera"
    FontPath    "/usr/share/fonts/unifont"
    FontPath	"/usr/share/fonts/75dpi:unscaled"
    FontPath	"/usr/share/fonts/100dpi:unscaled"
    FontPath	"/usr/share/fonts/artwiz"
    FontPath	"/usr/share/fonts/CID/"
    FontPath	"/usr/share/fonts/Speedo/"
    FontPath	"/usr/share/fonts/75dpi/"
    FontPath	"/usr/share/fonts/100dpi/"
    FontPath	"/usr/share/fonts/cyrillic"
    FontPath	"/usr/share/fonts/ukr"
    FontPath	"/usr/share/fonts/local/"

# ModulePath can be used to set a search path for the X server modules.
# The default path is shown here.

#    ModulePath	"/usr/X11R6/lib/modules"

EndSection

# **********************************************************************
# Module section -- this is an optional section which is used to specify
# which run-time loadable modules to load when the X server starts up.
# **********************************************************************

Section "Module"

    Load	"dbe"

# Load the glx module we obtained from nvidia
    Load        "glx"

# This loads the miscellaneous extensions module, and disables
# initialisation of the XFree86-DGA extension within that module.

    SubSection	"extmod"
    EndSubSection

    Load	"type1"
    Load	"freetype"

# Load the synaptics driver from synaptics ebuild.
    Load        "synaptics"

EndSection

================ ~/.fonts.conf ================

No such file

================ # Mozilla User Preferences

/* Do not edit this file.
 *
 * If you make changes to this file while the browser is running,
 * the changes will be overwritten when the browser exits.
 *
 * To make a manual change to preferences, you can visit the URL about:config
 * For more information, see http://www.mozilla.org/unix/customizing.html#prefs
 */

[snip]

user_pref("font.FreeType2.autohinted", true);
user_pref("font.FreeType2.enable", true);
user_pref("font.antialias.min", 0);
user_pref("font.directory.truetype.1", "/usr/share/fonts/ttf-bitstream-vera");
user_pref("font.directory.truetype.2", "/usr/share/fonts/TTF");
user_pref("font.directory.truetype.3", "/usr/share/fonts/corefonts");
user_pref("font.directory.truetype.4", "/usr/share/fonts/freefont");
user_pref("font.name.monospace.x-western", "Bitstream Vera Sans Mono");
user_pref("font.name.sans-serif.x-western", "Bitstream Vera Sans");
user_pref("font.name.serif.x-western", "Bitstream Vera Serif");
user_pref("font.scale.tt_bitmap.dark_text.gain", "0.0");
user_pref("font.scale.tt_bitmap.dark_text.min", 0);

[snip]

================ about:config default settings ================

font.freetype2.shared-library  libfreetype.so.6
font.FreeType2.unhinted        true
font.embedded_bitmaps.max      1000000
font.FreeType2.printing        true
-- 
gentoo-user@g.o mailing list