Re: [Pkg-fonts-devel] Package naming preference for non-ttf formats (eg. PSF)
On Fri, 15 Jul 2011, Paul Wise wrote:
> On Fri, Jul 15, 2011 at 1:53 PM, Paul Sladen <pkg-fonts@paul.sladen.org> wrote:
> > 'psf-' or 'console-' as a prefix, or postfix.
> using fonts-[foundry]-fontname-console.
Okay-dokey, '-console' is certainly a possibility then.
> I think I would be putting all the formats in one package,
The downside of an all-in-one binary package has the potential
for a large negative impact on minimal or server image sizes; the
bitmap fonts in question (for Ubuntu Mono Regular) are ~10 kilobytes
each; the intermediate BDF text-based format is ~150 kB.
For a server/non-X system, it doesn't make sense to install four
megabytes of .ttf files just for the framebuffer usage.[1][2]
> Are PSF files also used on the console on FreeBSD or Hurd?
PSF (for Linux 'setfont') might be a sub-optimal example. I believe
that FreeBSD uses 'vidcontrol' and '.fnt' files, although I'm not sure
whether this .fnt has combinality with anything else.
A better example would be the bitmap formats encoded for each of
Bterm(Debian installer)/Grub/gfxboot, where the usefulness of the
bitmap font format is not tied to kernel-specific loading utilities.
-Paul
[1] Note that the situation would be similar for webfonts, where
there are several different encoding are required for different
browsers. You wouldn't want to ship them unless required and when
running a webserver serving said webfonts.
[2] If you're wondering why, it's so that it's possible to easily set
the default Ubuntu (server) look-and-feel... and it's preferable,
wherever possible, to have an optional additional package to
seed/install, rather than to create a delta vs. Debian/upstream.
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