Fontconfig - May 2007 - Why did the default font settings change around freetype 2.3 release and why isn''t there at least a simple "no blurry fonts" settings?

Around the release of freetype-2.3.0 default font settings changed, i was
faced with blurred fonts, unlike the nice fonts that i was used to.

My question are:

- Why are this default settings this way?
- Why isn''t there a simple unblurred setting?

After after some searching i found, the settings i needed to at least
restore semi-acceptable fonts. Over time i tuned it and ended up with the
local.conf at the bottom of this e-mail.

My question is, isn''t it possible to use more sane defaults when the
bytecode interpeter is on and maybe try to improve the default selection of
fonts (override fonts that look like crap).
Some fonts actually look quite good with just hinting.

Sincerely,

Maarten Maathuis.

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<!DOCTYPE fontconfig SYSTEM "fonts.dtd">
<fontconfig>
<match target="font" >
<edit mode="assign" name="rgba" >
<const>none</const> </edit>
<edit mode="assign" name="hinting" >
<bool>true</bool> </edit>
<edit mode="assign" name="antialias">
<bool>false</bool> </edit>
<edit mode="assign" name="autohint" >
<bool>false</bool> </edit>
<edit mode="assign" name="hintstyle">
<const>hintfull</const> </edit>
</match>
</fontconfig>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL:
http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/fontconfig/attachments/20070515/eca8d841/attachment.html

Am i again asking the wrong mailinglist?

On 5/15/07, Maarten Maathuis <madman2003 at gmail.com>
wrote:
>
> Around the release of freetype-2.3.0 default font settings changed, i was
> faced with blurred fonts, unlike the nice fonts that i was used to.
>
> My question are:
>
> - Why are this default settings this way?
> - Why isn''t there a simple unblurred setting?
>
> After after some searching i found, the settings i needed to at least
> restore semi-acceptable fonts. Over time i tuned it and ended up with the
> local.conf at the bottom of this e-mail.
>
> My question is, isn''t it possible to use more sane defaults when
the
> bytecode interpeter is on and maybe try to improve the default selection of
> fonts (override fonts that look like crap).
> Some fonts actually look quite good with just hinting.
>
> Sincerely,
>
> Maarten Maathuis.
>
> <?xml version="1.0"?>
> <!DOCTYPE fontconfig SYSTEM "fonts.dtd">
> <fontconfig>
> <match target="font" >
> <edit mode="assign" name="rgba" >
<const>none</const> </edit>
> <edit mode="assign" name="hinting" >
<bool>true</bool> </edit>
> <edit mode="assign" name="antialias">
<bool>false</bool> </edit>
> <edit mode="assign" name="autohint" >
<bool>false</bool> </edit>
> <edit mode="assign" name="hintstyle">
<const>hintfull</const> </edit>
> </match>
> </fontconfig>
>
>
>
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL:
http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/fontconfig/attachments/20070516/79e21b11/attachment.html

On Wed, 2007-05-16 at 22:14 +0200, Maarten Maathuis
wrote:
> Am i again asking the wrong mailinglist?
Yes, your question really belongs to freetype list.  I don''t know why
Werner sent you this way.  Probably because he saw the XML snippets in
your mail and automatically thought you have a fontconfig question.

Other than that, it helps a lot if you ask smart questions [1].  You
write "Around the release of freetype-2.3.0 default font settings
changed".  If you know that, please explain what changed so people can
help you.  If you assumed that everybody knows that, surprise, you are
wrong.  Most of the time developer try to avoid irritating changes.  If
you see one, more often than not the developers are not seeing it.
Either because they don''t know about it or you have something
misconfigured on your system.

Anyway, asking a question like yours without attaching before/after
screenshots and listing your font options is almost guaranteed to not
get any responses.


Hope this helps,

behdad


[1] http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html
> On 5/15/07, Maarten Maathuis <madman2003 at gmail.com> wrote: 
>         Around the release of freetype-2.3.0 default font settings
>         changed, i was faced with blurred fonts, unlike the nice fonts
>         that i was used to.
>         
>         My question are: 
>         
>         - Why are this default settings this way?
>         - Why isn''t there a simple unblurred setting? 
>         
>         After after some searching i found, the settings i needed to
>         at least restore semi-acceptable fonts. Over time i tuned it
>         and ended up with the local.conf at the bottom of this e-mail.
>         
>         My question is, isn''t it possible to use more sane
defaults
>         when the bytecode interpeter is on and maybe try to improve
>         the default selection of fonts (override fonts that look like
>         crap). 
>         Some fonts actually look quite good with just hinting.
>         
>         Sincerely,
>         
>         Maarten Maathuis.
>         
>         <?xml version="1.0"?>
>         <!DOCTYPE fontconfig SYSTEM "fonts.dtd">
>         <fontconfig> 
>         <match target="font" >
>         <edit mode="assign" name="rgba" >
<const>none</const> </edit>
>         <edit mode="assign" name="hinting" >
<bool>true</bool>
>         </edit> 
>         <edit mode="assign" name="antialias">
<bool>false</bool>
>         </edit>
>         <edit mode="assign" name="autohint" >
<bool>false</bool>
>         </edit> 
>         <edit mode="assign" name="hintstyle">
<const>hintfull</const>
>         </edit>
>         </match>
>         </fontconfig>
>         
>         
>         
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Fontconfig mailing list
> Fontconfig at lists.freedesktop.org
> http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/fontconfig
-- 
behdad
http://behdad.org/
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 189 bytes
Desc: This is a digitally signed message part
Url :
http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/fontconfig/attachments/20070516/71af7c7d/attachment.pgp

Here are some screenshots, were the bad.jpg is a good approximation of the
original situation.

Maarten.

On 5/16/07, Behdad Esfahbod <besfahbo at redhat.com>
wrote:
>
> On Wed, 2007-05-16 at 22:14 +0200, Maarten Maathuis wrote:
> > Am i again asking the wrong mailinglist?
>
> Yes, your question really belongs to freetype list.  I don''t know
why
> Werner sent you this way.  Probably because he saw the XML snippets in
> your mail and automatically thought you have a fontconfig question.
>
> Other than that, it helps a lot if you ask smart questions [1].  You
> write "Around the release of freetype-2.3.0 default font settings
> changed".  If you know that, please explain what changed so people can
> help you.  If you assumed that everybody knows that, surprise, you are
> wrong.  Most of the time developer try to avoid irritating changes.  If
> you see one, more often than not the developers are not seeing it.
> Either because they don''t know about it or you have something
> misconfigured on your system.
>
> Anyway, asking a question like yours without attaching before/after
> screenshots and listing your font options is almost guaranteed to not
> get any responses.
>
>
> Hope this helps,
>
> behdad
>
>
> [1] http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html
>
> > On 5/15/07, Maarten Maathuis <madman2003 at gmail.com> wrote:
> >         Around the release of freetype-2.3.0 default font settings
> >         changed, i was faced with blurred fonts, unlike the nice fonts
> >         that i was used to.
> >
> >         My question are:
> >
> >         - Why are this default settings this way?
> >         - Why isn''t there a simple unblurred setting?
> >
> >         After after some searching i found, the settings i needed to
> >         at least restore semi-acceptable fonts. Over time i tuned it
> >         and ended up with the local.conf at the bottom of this e-mail.
> >
> >         My question is, isn''t it possible to use more sane
defaults
> >         when the bytecode interpeter is on and maybe try to improve
> >         the default selection of fonts (override fonts that look like
> >         crap).
> >         Some fonts actually look quite good with just hinting.
> >
> >         Sincerely,
> >
> >         Maarten Maathuis.
> >
> >         <?xml version="1.0"?>
> >         <!DOCTYPE fontconfig SYSTEM "fonts.dtd">
> >         <fontconfig>
> >         <match target="font" >
> >         <edit mode="assign" name="rgba" >
<const>none</const> </edit>
> >         <edit mode="assign" name="hinting" >
<bool>true</bool>
> >         </edit>
> >         <edit mode="assign"
name="antialias"> <bool>false</bool>
> >         </edit>
> >         <edit mode="assign" name="autohint"
> <bool>false</bool>
> >         </edit>
> >         <edit mode="assign"
name="hintstyle"> <const>hintfull</const>
> >         </edit>
> >         </match>
> >         </fontconfig>
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Fontconfig mailing list
> > Fontconfig at lists.freedesktop.org
> > http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/fontconfig
> --
> behdad
> http://behdad.org/
>
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL:
http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/fontconfig/attachments/20070517/d7985b8f/attachment.html
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: good.jpg
Type: image/jpeg
Size: 28640 bytes
Desc: not available
Url :
http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/fontconfig/attachments/20070517/d7985b8f/attachment-0002.jpg
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: bad.jpg
Type: image/jpeg
Size: 28731 bytes
Desc: not available
Url :
http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/fontconfig/attachments/20070517/d7985b8f/attachment-0003.jpg

I''m sorry, for the screenshot i changed the settings, to create the
bad.jpg.
When i tried to revert all the font related changes i could still remember,
i found it reverted to an acceptable:

- full hinting (i guess)
- anti aliasing on
- auto hinter off

The problem must have been fixed since 2.3.0. Sorry for not checking if the
problem persisted in the latest version. I am however certain that the BCI
was enabled at the time, since i could manually change the settings.

I do have one small question, why is the autohinter so ugly? (Is this on
purpose?)

Maarten.

On 5/17/07, Werner LEMBERG <wl at gnu.org> wrote:
>
> > Here are some screenshots, were the bad.jpg is a good approximation
> > of the original situation.
>
> Please try ftview and/or ftdiff on this particular font.
>
> > > > Am i again asking the wrong mailinglist?
> > >
> > > Yes, your question really belongs to freetype list.
>
> Not necessarily.
>
> > > I don''t know why Werner sent you this way.  Probably
because he
> > > saw the XML snippets in your mail and automatically thought you
> > > have a fontconfig question.
>
> :-) Indeed.  I need a way to reproduce a problem in a generic way, and
> even the before/after snapshot doesn''t really help, except that
the
> `good'' one looks like having bytecode hinting enabled and the
`bad''
> one disabled.
>
>
>     Werner
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL:
http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/fontconfig/attachments/20070517/3e7e4ecc/attachment.html

Is this consired a bug, because this only make the fonts thicker.

Maarten.

On 5/17/07, Werner LEMBERG <wl at gnu.org> wrote:
>
>
> > I do have one small question, why is the autohinter so ugly? (Is
> > this on purpose?)
>
> You are joking, aren''t you?  You should read, for example, this
> article
>
>   http://www.tug.org/TUGboat/Articles/tb24-3/lemberg.pdf
>
> to see how the autohinter is (more or less) working.  On the other
> hand, native bytecode hinting allows the interpreter to precisely move
> points so that the outline gets rasterized optimally.
>
> In general I think that the autohinter works *excellent* (thanks
> David!), with some glitches here and there due to bugs still in the
> code.  Additionally, some (non-latin) scripts don''t work really
well
> because a proper autohinting module is still missing.
>
>
>     Werner
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL:
http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/fontconfig/attachments/20070517/3d992036/attachment.html
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: good2.jpg
Type: image/jpeg
Size: 99315 bytes
Desc: not available
Url :
http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/fontconfig/attachments/20070517/3d992036/attachment-0002.jpg
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: bad2.jpg
Type: image/jpeg
Size: 101333 bytes
Desc: not available
Url :
http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/fontconfig/attachments/20070517/3d992036/attachment-0003.jpg

"Maarten Maathuis" <madman2003 at gmail.com> writes:
> I do have one small question, why is the autohinter so ugly? (Is
> this on purpose?)
It''s an autohinter -- it''s doing the best job it can with the
limited
information it''s got. The Freetype guys have done wonders with it over
the last couple of years; it''s not quite as good as a human type
designer can manage yet, but in the latest releases it''s often hard to
tell the difference.

I''ve found it''s worth playing with unhinted font rendering if
you''re
on a big display, though, since that avoids the glyph distortion that
hinting introduces. David Turner and Jinghua Luo (among others) did
some experimental work which used FIR filtering to produce extremely
nice unhinted text rendering on subpixel-capable displays without the
colour fringing that cairo/libXft usually produce; I''ve put the
patches I''m currently using here:

  http://offog.org/stuff/cairo-fir.diff
  http://offog.org/stuff/libXft-fir.diff

(If you want to see how this looks without messing with your system
libraries, the Gargoyle IF interpreter has a built-in text renderer
that uses the same approach:

  http://ccxvii.net/gargoyle/

Trying to figure out why Gargoyle''s text looked nice on my display was
how I found the patches above...)

-- 
Adam Sampson <ats at offog.org>                        
<http://offog.org/>

I might give it a try, thank you.

Maarten.

On 5/18/07, Adam Sampson <ats at offog.org> wrote:
>
> "Maarten Maathuis" <madman2003 at gmail.com> writes:
>
> > I do have one small question, why is the autohinter so ugly? (Is
> > this on purpose?)
>
> It''s an autohinter -- it''s doing the best job it can with
the limited
> information it''s got. The Freetype guys have done wonders with it
over
> the last couple of years; it''s not quite as good as a human type
> designer can manage yet, but in the latest releases it''s often
hard to
> tell the difference.
>
> I''ve found it''s worth playing with unhinted font
rendering if you''re
> on a big display, though, since that avoids the glyph distortion that
> hinting introduces. David Turner and Jinghua Luo (among others) did
> some experimental work which used FIR filtering to produce extremely
> nice unhinted text rendering on subpixel-capable displays without the
> colour fringing that cairo/libXft usually produce; I''ve put the
> patches I''m currently using here:
>
>   http://offog.org/stuff/cairo-fir.diff
>   http://offog.org/stuff/libXft-fir.diff
>
> (If you want to see how this looks without messing with your system
> libraries, the Gargoyle IF interpreter has a built-in text renderer
> that uses the same approach:
>
>   http://ccxvii.net/gargoyle/
>
> Trying to figure out why Gargoyle''s text looked nice on my display
was
> how I found the patches above...)
>
> --
> Adam Sampson <ats at offog.org>                        
<http://offog.org/>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Freetype-devel mailing list
> Freetype-devel at nongnu.org
> http://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/freetype-devel
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL:
http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/fontconfig/attachments/20070518/b8a5a489/attachment.htm

The effect is decent on large fonts, but for normal sizes i prefer bytecode
hinted fonts.
At the moment it seems normal anti aliasing helps the fonts become a little
less grainy, without making them overly thick.
I''m still trying what is the best turn over point. But up-to-and
including
size 12 does not benefit from this.

Maarten.

On 5/18/07, Maarten Maathuis <madman2003 at gmail.com>
wrote:
>
> I might give it a try, thank you.
>
> Maarten.
>
> On 5/18/07, Adam Sampson <ats at offog.org> wrote:
> >
> > "Maarten Maathuis" <madman2003 at gmail.com> writes:
> >
> > > I do have one small question, why is the autohinter so ugly? (Is
> > > this on purpose?)
> >
> > It''s an autohinter -- it''s doing the best job it can
with the limited
> > information it''s got. The Freetype guys have done wonders
with it over
> > the last couple of years; it''s not quite as good as a human
type
> > designer can manage yet, but in the latest releases it''s
often hard to
> > tell the difference.
> >
> > I''ve found it''s worth playing with unhinted font
rendering if you''re
> > on a big display, though, since that avoids the glyph distortion that
> > hinting introduces. David Turner and Jinghua Luo (among others) did
> > some experimental work which used FIR filtering to produce extremely
> > nice unhinted text rendering on subpixel-capable displays without the
> > colour fringing that cairo/libXft usually produce; I''ve put
the
> > patches I''m currently using here:
> >
> >   http://offog.org/stuff/cairo-fir.diff
> >   http://offog.org/stuff/libXft-fir.diff
> >
> > (If you want to see how this looks without messing with your system
> > libraries, the Gargoyle IF interpreter has a built-in text renderer
> > that uses the same approach:
> >
> >   http://ccxvii.net/gargoyle/
> >
> > Trying to figure out why Gargoyle''s text looked nice on my
display was
> > how I found the patches above...)
> >
> > --
> > Adam Sampson <ats at offog.org>                        
<http://offog.org/>
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Freetype-devel mailing list
> > Freetype-devel at nongnu.org
> > http://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/freetype-devel
> >
>
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL:
http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/fontconfig/attachments/20070518/a8868e95/attachment.html

I would have a hard time getting used to the autohinter and i probably
won''t. I have pretty much settled for byte code hinting with anti
aliasing (as opposed to the screenshots i posted, which have anti
aliasing off). The eventual solution to the problem of of smooth fonts
is really high dpi screens, but that lies (hopefully) in the future.

Thank you for your replies (@everyone), hope i didn''t annoy you too
much ;-)

Maarten.

On 5/21/07, David Turner <david at freetype.org>
wrote:
> Hello Maarten,
>
> On Thu, 17 May 2007 11:00:46 +0200, "Maarten Maathuis"
<madman2003 at gmail.com> said:
> > I do have one small question, why is the autohinter so ugly? (Is this
on
> > purpose?)
> >
>
> Of course, it *is* on purpose. You see, we at the FreeType Team, we take
pride in
> producing *only* the ugliest and most disgusting text rendering we can get.
Our motto
> is, after all, "Proudly making users vomit since 1996 !" :o)
>
> More seriously, the auto-hinter produces text that is a lot closer to the
original
> character shapes than anything you''ll get from a highly tuned
bytecoded TrueType font.
>
> What I mean is that what you consider "good" text here is a
highly distorted version
> of the original font; it''s more similar to a hand-coded bitmap
than anything else and
> there is no way that the auto-hinter can match this kind of work with the
small CPU
> and memory resources it can use.
>
> And personally, I''m pretty tired of bytecoded text rendering. I
find it a lot more ugly
> than the auto-hinter''s output. that''s not to say that the
latter can''t be improved but
> your mileage may vary.
>
> - David Turner
> - The FreeType Project  (www.freetype.org)
>
>
> > Maarten.
> >
> > On 5/17/07, Werner LEMBERG <wl at gnu.org> wrote:
> > >
> > > > Here are some screenshots, were the bad.jpg is a good
approximation
> > > > of the original situation.
> > >
> > > Please try ftview and/or ftdiff on this particular font.
> > >
> > > > > > Am i again asking the wrong mailinglist?
> > > > >
> > > > > Yes, your question really belongs to freetype list.
> > >
> > > Not necessarily.
> > >
> > > > > I don''t know why Werner sent you this way. 
Probably because he
> > > > > saw the XML snippets in your mail and automatically
thought you
> > > > > have a fontconfig question.
> > >
> > > :-) Indeed.  I need a way to reproduce a problem in a generic
way, and
> > > even the before/after snapshot doesn''t really help,
except that the
> > > `good'' one looks like having bytecode hinting enabled
and the `bad''
> > > one disabled.
> > >
> > >
> > >     Werner
> > >
>