Ok, I promise. This will be my last post on font rendering in Linux!
As usual, while tweaking some of the Linux font settings, I accidentally discovered that you can make X render fonts **exactly** as in OS X! (Don’t ask me how it works. I do not know. But it works perfectly!)
This is what I did:
- Removed all the existing font customizations that I have done earlier
- Made sure that I do not have a .fonts.conf in home directory.
- Made sure that only the default .conf files that shipped with Dapper are in /etc/fonts folder.
- Ensured that I have the Turners cleartype patch installed.(If you do not know how to apply patches or if you are too lazy to apply your own patch, grab the precompiled patched binaries from here.). Update: Ubuntu Edgy Eft users can get precompiled binaries with Turner’s patch here.
- Made sure that I have all the .ttf fonts from my Windows installation in Ubuntu too.
- Reconfigured fontconfig by running:
sudo dpkg-reconfigure fontconfig
On the first screen, I selected “None” and on the second and third screens I said no. Fontconfig will update your font settings and regenerate your font cache.
Turned on sub-pixel rendering in gnome font settings.
Restart X: ctrl+alt+backspace.
Here are some screenshots: (Tahoma never looked so better.)
Font preferences:
Apple website
Nautilus:
Digg home page:
This post as it was typed:
This blog post (Using wordpress preview. Look at Lucida Grande in all its glory!)
Update : Turns out that Mac uses “byte code interpretation” to achieve this font rendering. The fontconfig that we do in the above steps turns on BCI in freetype too. Hence the similar rendering effects. Because of this, you don’t need to install Turner’s patches – so ignore step 4.
You are a font of information about font rendering!
🙂
hi dudes. I had problems when I trie dto install the binary packages you linked here, it wanted to downgrade some packages so I didn’t wanted to follow with your guide. I’m a os x user and I thank to you this great tip for linux, but well, I think I’m not able to install it
Thanks anyways.
@jp:
To achieve these effects you DO NOT need to install anything. All you have to do is “sudo dpkg-reconfigure fontconfig” and select the options as indicated in the post.
hi. thanks for replying.
’cause I cannot install some dev-packages I got when I installed aiglx 
Ok, but what’s about the Turners cleartype patch? I had problems installing it
I did all you said, but I don’t have the patch, so I din’t get the ‘osx’ font hint 😦
sorry for ‘spamming’ xD
http://flickr.com/photo_zoom.gne?id=204097197&size=o
here’s a screenshot of the apple.com/software site.
I don’t have de windows fonts ’cause I don’t have windows!
Thanks 🙂
now I could! But I had to reinstall ubuntu :9
Now I’m going to try if I can install aiglx without broke the fontconfig patches. thanks :9
@jp
Congrats and welcome to the wonderful world of linux and hacking.
Try the quinn repository for aiglx. The forums are pretty helpful and the setup is also pretty easy.
All the best.
You are a genius! Thanks!
How did u get the tahoma font? It’s the only font I’ve not found
Regards
You can get it from your Windows installation if you have one. Otherwise, internet is your only option. If you still could not find it, drop me a mail.
Thanks buddy! Your tip is awsome! Now linux is really not only powerful, but also beautiful 🙂 Cheers!
How can i do this in edgy?
Same question as Mikael. I tried this, but failed to get install Turner’s patch on Edgy. Could you tell us little more hint on that?
Hi Mikael and ZeeG,
Sub pixel font smoothing packages are now available for Edgy too. Please follow this thread on Ubuntuforums:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=235526
To mimic Apple-like rendering for fonts, I have always used the BCI with no hinting, looks very Apple-like, I know cause I own a Macbook as well. There is a font that is pretty good to use with Ubuntu its Luxi or Freetype, I think Freetype, looks really good with almost everything.
I use the following:
Sans-serif: Freetype-sans
Serif: Utopia
Monospace: Courier 10pitch
it looks really good.
Its great!!
i’m using debian, and it worked just fine. Monaco finally looks good. However, two problems emerged:
1) Pixel (or bitmapped?) fonts like ProggyClean dont render great
2) Emacs overwrites that configuration (it uses its own rendering).
goddam emacs…
Anyone know how to do this on a non-debian based Linux (Fedora or SUSE)? Not everyone has dpkg-reconfigure fontconfig!
@linkx
Refer to my other post here
https://jaganath.wordpress.com/2006/11/16/cleartype-lcd-patch-on-mandriva-linux-2007/
Users have confirmed that it works on SUSE and Fedora too!!
Your fonts look as awful (blurry) as they do on an any Apple computer: http://www.atpm.com/12.01/paradigm.shtml
Windows wins again.
I haven’t tested it yet, but there are binaries of Turners cleartype patch for Feisty now: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=343670.
By the way, thanks for the great tutorial. It worked like a charm on Edgy.
Your site has become my favorite site!
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