Re: Anybody else seeing this GTK2 bug?

[Florian Kulzer <florian@molphys.leidenuniv.nl>]

On Sun, Jul 23, 2006 at 15:39:54 +0200, Torquil Macdonald Sørensen wrote:
> > Where to set anti-aliasing? I don't see this configuration on gnome font
> > preference. See attach for detail
> 
> I didn't find it either, so instead I set put 'export GDK_USE_XFT=1' in 
> ~/.xsession and ~/.bashrc. It will then apply to applications started both 
> from X menus, and from xterm windows. But there is probably a better way to 
> do it.
> 
> Looking at the Gnome Font preferences, it looks to me that it is the "Best 
> contrast" setting that is equavalent to anti-aliasing. But it is not clear to 
> me if that will apply to all GTK apps or just Gnome apps.

You can set it in your ~/.fonts.conf, then it should be the same for all
(freetype using) X applications. I have an LCD display and like to use
anti-aliasing with hintstyle "full", but without RGB subpixel hinting.
The corresponding ~/.fonts.conf looks like this:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<!DOCTYPE fontconfig SYSTEM "fonts.dtd">
<fontconfig>
 <match target="font" >
  <edit mode="assign" name="hinting" >
   <bool>true</bool>
  </edit>
 </match>
 <match target="font" >
  <edit mode="assign" name="hintstyle" >
   <const>hintfull</const>
  </edit>
 </match>
 <match target="font" >
  <edit mode="assign" name="rgba" >
   <const>none</const>
  </edit>
 </match>
 <match target="font" >
  <edit mode="assign" name="antialias" >
   <bool>true</bool>
  </edit>
 </match>
</fontconfig>

If you do not like how your fonts look with full hinting then you can
use anti-aliasing only:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<!DOCTYPE fontconfig SYSTEM "fonts.dtd">
<fontconfig>
 <match target="font" >
  <edit mode="assign" name="hinting" >
   <bool>false</bool>
  </edit>
 </match>
 <match target="font" >
  <edit mode="assign" name="antialias" >
   <bool>true</bool>
  </edit>
 </match>
</fontconfig>

I suspect that the Gnome font configuration dialog uses ~/.fonts.conf as
well to set up the font rendering according to the user's preferences,
but I don't know for sure since I don't use Gnome. You can make some
changes via the dialog and check this file, then you will see which
Gnome option corresponds to which font setting. (The fact that the Gnome
developers refuse to use standard technical terms like "anti-aliasing"
is one of the main reasons why I don't use Gnome, by the way.)

-- 
Regards,
          Florian