Re: 100dpi vs 75dpi

[Bill Moseley <moseley@hank.org>]

On 10 Apr 2002 10:45:57 -0700 Jeffrey W. Baker wrote:

> > I start X by specifying 100 dpi.  I'm not sure exactly what that
> > does, but it makes my fonts a better size.

BTW -I specify that -dpi setting in /etc/X11/xinit/xserverrc

  exec /usr/bin/X11/X -dpi 100 -nolisten tcp

> 
> That is a side effect and not the intended result.  If you want
> smaller fonts, you should specify them in your preferences.  If the
> defaults are too big, the developers should give better defaults.

...

> The X Windows System uses the resolution to draw text on the screen. 
> A program might request the letter A 18 points (0.25 inches) tall. 
> The X server knows that my screen has 94 pixels per inch, so it must
> draw the letter A 0.25*94 = 24 pixels tall.

Thanks for the great explanation.  It makes sense, really.  72 points
should be an inch on the screen.  

(Although if you run a high resolution on a smaller monitor and X
adjusts the fonts to keep a 72point font 1" then images will look small
compared to the text. Oh well.)

So, if I'm following, if X knows my physical screen size, it should be
able to render fonts to the correct point size.

So I set in XF86Config-4 in my "monitor" section:

    DisplaySize     362 273

Now, if I run X like this:

   xinit /usr/local/bin/sylpheed -- /usr/bin/X11/X

and I set up sylpheed to use a TT font (I'm running xfstt).  

  -ttf-courier new-medium-r-normal-*-14-*-*-*-m-*-iso8859-1


Now, changing screen sizes (Ctrl-Alt-+) my fonts do change relative to
the screen size.

I tried with other applications, too, such as gedit, mozilla, kedit.
Removing DisplaySize seems to have no effect, either.  Passing various
-dpi settings to X doesn't seem to do anything either.

My conclusion is that I must still not understand.  :(

My head hurts.

Thanks,


-- 
Bill Moseley


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