Fontconfig - Sep 2011 - What metric does fontconfig use to select a font

I just got messed up with so many <prefer>s and <accept>s. And it
seems the
first font in the list after all <prefer>/<accept>/<default>
have been
applied needn''t have to be the finally selected one. If the order in
the
list doesn''t count, why make that list?

And how does the strong/weak binding affects the selection?

What''s the logic of this font-choosing algorithm?

And what should I do to make sure one specific font will certainly be chosen
when executing, say, ''fc-match sans''?

I''ve read the man page but still didn''t quite understand it.
Thanks.



-- 



Cyker Way
E-mail: cykerway at gmail.com
http://www.cykerway.com
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Hi,
> And what should I do to make sure one specific font will certainly be
> chosen
> when executing, say, ''fc-match sans''?
maybe something like the following example in ~/.fonts.conf could work:

  <match target="pattern">
    <test name="family"
qual="all"><string>sans-serif</string></test>
    <edit mode="assign_replace" name="family">
      <string>Helvetica</string>
    </edit>
    <edit mode="assign_replace" name="foundry">
      <string>Adobe</string>
    </edit>
  </match>

But I''m not sure if this is a good idea, since the font you choose
might
only be suitable for a limited range of character sets. Maybe that could
be sorted out by adding additional "lang" tests...

Raimund



-- 
R.Steger Tel. +49-179-2981632 icq 16845346

Hmm, it seems ~/.fonts.conf will be the first processed configurations. So
this solution should work. Thanks.

BTW, how does fontconfig sort the precedence of fonts according to the
application request? If this question is not fully answered, maybe other
problems will arise in the future. Do you have any idea on that?

2011/9/5 Raimund Steger <rs at mytum.de>
> Hi,
>
> > And what should I do to make sure one specific font will certainly be
> > chosen
> > when executing, say, ''fc-match sans''?
>
> maybe something like the following example in ~/.fonts.conf could work:
>
>  <match target="pattern">
>    <test name="family"
qual="all"><string>sans-serif</string></test>
>    <edit mode="assign_replace" name="family">
>      <string>Helvetica</string>
>    </edit>
>    <edit mode="assign_replace" name="foundry">
>      <string>Adobe</string>
>    </edit>
>  </match>
>
> But I''m not sure if this is a good idea, since the font you choose
might
> only be suitable for a limited range of character sets. Maybe that could
> be sorted out by adding additional "lang" tests...
>
> Raimund
>
>
>
> --
> R.Steger Tel. +49-179-2981632 icq 16845346
>
>

-- 



Cyker Way
E-mail: cykerway at gmail.com
http://www.cykerway.com
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That depends on what kind of the fontconfig configuration files you have.
you may get more information from the debugging log by setting the env var
like FC_DEBUG=4.

On Mon, Sep 5, 2011 at 7:29 PM, Cyker Way <cykerway at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hmm, it seems ~/.fonts.conf will be the first processed configurations. So
> this solution should work. Thanks.
>
> BTW, how does fontconfig sort the precedence of fonts according to the
> application request? If this question is not fully answered, maybe other
> problems will arise in the future. Do you have any idea on that?
>
>
> 2011/9/5 Raimund Steger <rs at mytum.de>
>
>> Hi,
>>
>> > And what should I do to make sure one specific font will certainly
be
>> > chosen
>> > when executing, say, ''fc-match sans''?
>>
>> maybe something like the following example in ~/.fonts.conf could work:
>>
>>  <match target="pattern">
>>    <test name="family"
qual="all"><string>sans-serif</string></test>
>>    <edit mode="assign_replace" name="family">
>>      <string>Helvetica</string>
>>    </edit>
>>    <edit mode="assign_replace"
name="foundry">
>>      <string>Adobe</string>
>>    </edit>
>>  </match>
>>
>> But I''m not sure if this is a good idea, since the font you
choose might
>> only be suitable for a limited range of character sets. Maybe that
could
>> be sorted out by adding additional "lang" tests...
>>
>> Raimund
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> R.Steger Tel. +49-179-2981632 icq 16845346
>>
>>
>
>
> --
>
>
>
> Cyker Way
> E-mail: cykerway at gmail.com
> http://www.cykerway.com
>
> _______________________________________________
> Fontconfig mailing list
> Fontconfig at lists.freedesktop.org
> http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/fontconfig
>
>

-- 
Akira TAGOH
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Hi,
> On Mon, Sep 5, 2011 at 7:29 PM, Cyker Way <cykerway at gmail.com>
wrote:
> [...]
>> BTW, how does fontconfig sort the precedence of fonts according to the
>> application request? If this question is not fully answered, maybe
other
>> problems will arise in the future. Do you have any idea on that?
You could say that the "order" of the fonts is that of their distance
from
the application-provided pattern.

It is detailed on

  http://www.freedesktop.org/software/fontconfig/fontconfig-user.html#AEN25

In short:
Your application specifies a pattern with a number of properties, like
family, pixelsize, etc. (Example: "Bitstream Vera Sans:pixelsize=13")
This pattern is modified through the <match target="pattern">
rules in
your config files.
(Every element in the pattern can in fact be a list ordered from good
candidate to not-so-good candidate.)
The modified pattern is then compared to all fonts that have been scanned,
using a predefined order of properties -- see the above link.
Properties like foundry and family weigh more than say, outline. Others
like file or fontformat are not used at all, so you cannot select a font
based on its filename.
It should also be noted that some applications have their own fallback
scheme on top of what fontconfig provides, e. g. based on CSS.
> [...]
> you may get more information from the debugging log by setting the env var
> like FC_DEBUG=4.
This is also a very good idea (be prepared for some output).

Raimund



-- 
R.Steger Tel. +49-179-2981632 icq 16845346

"Raimund Steger" <rs at mytum.de> writes:
> Hi,
>
>> And what should I do to make sure one specific font will certainly be
>> chosen
>> when executing, say, ''fc-match sans''?
>
> maybe something like the following example in ~/.fonts.conf could work:
>
>   <match target="pattern">
>     <test name="family"
qual="all"><string>sans-serif</string></test>
>     <edit mode="assign_replace" name="family">
>       <string>Helvetica</string>
>     </edit>
>     <edit mode="assign_replace" name="foundry">
>       <string>Adobe</string>
>     </edit>
>   </match>
>
> But I''m not sure if this is a good idea, since the font you choose
might
> only be suitable for a limited range of character sets. Maybe that could
> be sorted out by adding additional "lang" tests...
I have made a GUI Fontik(https://gitorious.org/fontik) which can perform
some of these tasks.Have a try.

thanks
-suresh
>
> Raimund