#1 2025-03-22 13:01:45

exe

Member

Registered: 2015-09-29

Posts: 123

Improve font rendering on Linux

hi !

Here is a script that makes font rendering on linux much better.

I've tried it and it's wonderful

https://github.com/maximilionus/lucidglyph

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johnraff

nullglob

From: Nagoya, Japan

Registered: 2015-09-09

Posts: 12,657

Website

Re: Improve font rendering on Linux

Interesting to see that my Boron system appears to be already using grayscale antialiasing:

john@boron:~$ gsettings get org.gnome.desktop.interface font-antialiasing
'grayscale'

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Head_on_a_Stick

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From: London

Registered: 2015-09-29

Posts: 9,093

Website

Re: Improve font rendering on Linux

^ That's a dconf setting.

BunsenLabs sets antialiasing to rgb here and here.

To change the dconf database I use /etc/dconf/db/deadbang.conf and apply the changes in the autostart file.

Not sure about applying grayscale universally, rgb works better with LCD screens (allegedly).

EDIT: the no-stem-darkening options for $FREETYPE_PROPERTIES look very useful, I might steal those myself.

https://github.com/maximilionus/lucidgl … idglyph.sh

Last edited by Head_on_a_Stick (2025-03-23 19:38:54)

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johnraff

nullglob

From: Nagoya, Japan

Registered: 2015-09-09

Posts: 12,657

Website

Re: Improve font rendering on Linux

Interesting to see that my Boron system appears to be already using grayscale antialiasing:

john@boron:~$ gsettings get org.gnome.desktop.interface font-antialiasing
'grayscale'

^ That's a dconf setting.

BunsenLabs sets antialiasing to rgb here and here.

Yes. The point was that my BunsenLabs Boron system, with the above default rgb setting in fonts.conf, was showing font-aliasing as set to grayscale when checked via gsettings. That was not of my doing.  'gsettings' is provided by libglib2.0-bin, a Recommend of bunsen-utilities, but I don't know what default settings it comes with, if any.

EDIT: it's possible to look with dconf-editor, and sure enough the default setting for org.gnome.desktop.interface font-antialiasing is 'grayscale'. So the question becomes, which takes precedence, dconf or fonts.conf, and/or under what circumstances?

Not sure about applying grayscale universally, rgb works better with LCD screens (allegedly).

My impression too. Where would you look to see what was being applied "universally"?

Last edited by johnraff (2025-03-24 05:04:12)

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Head_on_a_Stick

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From: London

Registered: 2015-09-29

Posts: 9,093

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Re: Improve font rendering on Linux

Most applications will respect the fontconfig settings except for very old stuff that checks the Xft database and programs that use the dconf database, which is mostly GNOME applications.

It would be best to harmonise the dconf setting with the Xft & fontconfig configuration, I think.

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johnraff

nullglob

From: Nagoya, Japan

Registered: 2015-09-09

Posts: 12,657

Website

Re: Improve font rendering on Linux

It would be best to harmonise the dconf setting with the Xft & fontconfig configuration, I think.

That sounds sensible, and I'll do that eventually.

But I'm still curious as to where that default dconf setting originally came from. Considering dconf-editor is just an editor, and gsettings is already showing grayscale, did the setting arrive with the installation of libglib2.0-bin?

john@boron:~$ apt show libglib2.0-bin
Package: libglib2.0-bin
Version: 2.74.6-2+deb12u5
Priority: optional
Section: misc
Source: glib2.0
Maintainer: Debian GNOME Maintainers <pkg-gnome-maintainers@lists.alioth.debian.org>
Depends: libglib2.0-data, libc6 (>= 2.34), libelf1 (>= 0.142), libglib2.0-0 (= 2.74.6-2+deb12u5)
Description: Programs for the GLib library
 GLib is a library containing many useful C routines for things such
 as trees, hashes, lists, and strings.  It is a useful general-purpose
 C library used by projects such as GTK+, GIMP, and GNOME.
 .
 This package contains the program files which is used for the libraries
 and others.

@HoaS do you have libglib2.0-bin on your system, and if so what's the output of:

gsettings get org.gnome.desktop.interface font-antialiasing

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Introduction to the Bunsenlabs Boron Desktop

greenjeans

Member

Registered: 2025-01-18

Posts: 240

Website

Re: Improve font rendering on Linux

gsettings get org.gnome.desktop.interface font-antialiasing

Grayscale here too, libglib2.0 is installed.

Head_on_a_Stick

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From: London

Registered: 2015-09-29

Posts: 9,093

Website

Re: Improve font rendering on Linux

Grayscale is the default dconf setting. I think it's hard coded but I can't be bothered trawling the codebase to find a link (sorry).

EDIT: dconf-editor shows "Grayscale" as the default in the GUI.

Last edited by Head_on_a_Stick (2025-03-25 20:16:53)

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marens

Member

From: World without M$

Registered: 2023-02-02

Posts: 879

Re: Improve font rendering on Linux

My system is Ubuntu (GNOME) and libglib2.0-bin is installed, but:

$ gsettings get org.gnome.desktop.interface font-antialiasing
No such key “font-antialiasing”

After a quick search (dconf-editor):

$ gsettings get org.gnome.settings-daemon.plugins.xsettings antialiasing
'rgba'

GUI:

 

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