Hi Max (et al),
On Tue, Jul 15, 2025 at 17:14 (-0600), Max Chernoff via ntg-context wrote:
> On Tue, 2025-07-15 at 10:06 -0300, Jim wrote:
>> Might I ask you
>> (a) To confirm that your PDF reader does, indeed, do SPR?
>> (I.e., not just everything else on your system.)
>> and
> Ah, good point, I should have checked first. Using the following test
> file:
> \loadtypescriptfile[plex]
> \setupbodyfont[plex-thin, sans]
> \setupinterlinespace[1sp]
> \define[1]\makeline{%
> \setupbodyfont[#1pt]%
> \dorecurse{
> \numexpression(\textwidth / \widthofstring{l}) - 1\relax
> }{l\hfill}%
> \unskip%
> \par%
> }
> \define\makelines{%
> \processcommalist[2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 11, 12, 16, 24, 36, 72]\makeline%
> }
> \startTEXpage[width=6in]
> \makelines
> \startframedtext[
> offset=0pt,
> width=broad,
> background=color,
> backgroundcolor=black,
> color=white,
> ]
> \makelines
> \stopframedtext
> \stopTEXpage
Interesting test page. More on that below (*).
> Chromium and Firefox (pdf.js) use subpixel rendering,
Indeed they do, to their credit.
> while Evince, Okular, MuPDF, and xpdf just use greyscale antialiasing.
Better than nothing. A bit. I guess. :-)
> I usually use Firefox to view PDFs, and everything else on my system uses
> subpixel rendering, so I just assumed that the rest of the PDF viewers
> did as well.
If only. :-(
(*) Your example shows one of the other weak points of viewers like evince.
When I display the output with both acroread (or ffx) and evince, the
"white on black" portion looks good in acroread, in that each line of "L"s
has a more or less uniform grey level. But in evince (on my screen,
anyway, YMMV), the first three lines (as well as the seventh) are very
noticeably less bright than the others. Acroread: good. Evince: bad.
I have found in the past (when putting white text on a dark-coloured
background for presentations) that most (Linux-based, anyway) PDF readers
do a bad job of rendering text in this situation. Consequently, every time
I see someone extolling the virtues of evince, kpdf, and/or their other PDF
reading program(s), I consider that I might have a badly-configured system
and therefore I'm missing out because of that. But further enquiry has, to
date, always confirmed my suspicions that evince and friends don't do SPR,
nor render "white on dark" well.
Thus I carry on using my ancient but venerable acroread 9.5.5., awaiting
that glorious future day when more PDF readers learn how to do SPR.
Cheers.
Jim
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