Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
On Sun, Dec 05, 2004 at 09:19:25PM -0600, Billy Biggs wrote: > Regardless, my proposal is simply to have Xft always default to 96 > DPI, independent of the DPI value you put in X. I read your proposal, and find it is a good one (well argued and everything). However, this means that the real dpi value has to be easily made accessible, as well as adequate font rendering, for all imaging and press applications (gimp, image viewers, gpdf, ggv, scribus, inkscape and co, and ideally Acrobat Reader, but hey). I am no programmer and do not know how easy it is to make it a switch (the case of the video projector is a good one, up to the point where somebody will want to proof a 4m×3m poster using gpdf and a video projector). I already know that I must set acroread to 137% to obtain real size. However, default margins in all widgets probably should be measured using DPI-related (the font DPI, not the other one) units. If one wants big fonts However, Keith's computation is a bit hard: I tested 120 dpi with my 1600x1200 and already find those fonts are gigantic. I would not like staying with 150. By the way, I cannot make sense of the font sizes in firefox. Looks like it uses 75 dpi or 72 dpi as a reference. -- JCD
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
On Sun, Dec 05, 2004 at 09:19:25PM -0600, Billy Biggs <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > The GNOME system has the nice property that it can be changed without > restarting X. Moving towards systems with this property is a good > thing. GNOME also advertises it in a vendor neutral way (XSETTINGS) and > sets the Xft X resource so that other applications use its DPI value, so > it seems like it is going in the right direction. > > Regardless, my proposal is simply to have Xft always default to 96 > DPI, independent of the DPI value you put in X. Are you telling me you are wanting to force all my Xft applications to use a 96 dpi display while I explicitly configured X to use 112 dpi ? I firmly oppose to that. Mike
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
On Mon, Dec 06, 2004 at 07:26:24AM +0100, Jean-Christophe Dubacq <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > However, Keith's computation is a bit hard: I tested 120 dpi with my > 1600x1200 and already find those fonts are gigantic. I would not like > staying with 150. Probably because you're using 12 or 13 points sized fonts while you should be using 8 or 9 points. > By the way, I cannot make sense of the font sizes in firefox. Looks like > it uses 75 dpi or 72 dpi as a reference. Yup, roughly. They decided to use a pixel value, and one that is quite low for dense screens. Mike
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
On Mon, 2004-12-06 at 16:20 +0900, Mike Hommey wrote: > On Sun, Dec 05, 2004 at 09:19:25PM -0600, Billy Biggs <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > wrote: > > The GNOME system has the nice property that it can be changed without > > restarting X. Moving towards systems with this property is a good > > thing. GNOME also advertises it in a vendor neutral way (XSETTINGS) and > > sets the Xft X resource so that other applications use its DPI value, so > > it seems like it is going in the right direction. > > > > Regardless, my proposal is simply to have Xft always default to 96 > > DPI, independent of the DPI value you put in X. > > Are you telling me you are wanting to force all my Xft applications to > use a 96 dpi display while I explicitly configured X to use 112 dpi ? > I firmly oppose to that. No, he said he wanted to make Xft applications default to 96 DPI. Nothing stopping you from tweaking the Xft.dpi value to what you want it to be. I think that he has a good proposal. If Xft.dpi defaults to 96 DPI, but it is easy to tweak to what I want it to be once I log in, that is good enough for me. Rgds, -- Anders Karlsson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Trudheim Technology Limited signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
Around 8 o'clock on Dec 6, Anders Karlsson wrote: > No, he said he wanted to make Xft applications default to 96 DPI. > Nothing stopping you from tweaking the Xft.dpi value to what you want it > to be. So should Xft just default to 96dpi and let the Xft.dpi value override that? Right now, Xft defaults to the "real" display resolution, which I think we've come to see as almost always the wrong answer (at least as a default). That would be a more pervasive way to effect this change. -keith pgp5NeiCxxTbS.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
On Mon, Dec 06, 2004 at 08:52:57AM +, Anders Karlsson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > On Mon, 2004-12-06 at 16:20 +0900, Mike Hommey wrote: > > On Sun, Dec 05, 2004 at 09:19:25PM -0600, Billy Biggs <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > wrote: > > > The GNOME system has the nice property that it can be changed without > > > restarting X. Moving towards systems with this property is a good > > > thing. GNOME also advertises it in a vendor neutral way (XSETTINGS) and > > > sets the Xft X resource so that other applications use its DPI value, so > > > it seems like it is going in the right direction. > > > > > > Regardless, my proposal is simply to have Xft always default to 96 > > > DPI, independent of the DPI value you put in X. > > > > Are you telling me you are wanting to force all my Xft applications to > > use a 96 dpi display while I explicitly configured X to use 112 dpi ? > > I firmly oppose to that. > > No, he said he wanted to make Xft applications default to 96 DPI. > Nothing stopping you from tweaking the Xft.dpi value to what you want it > to be. Which means I'll have to tweak *2* configurations for *1* DPI. And fortunately, I don't use several user accounts, otherwise that would be even more configuration tweaks. Mike
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
On Mon, Dec 06, 2004 at 12:58:30AM -0800, Keith Packard <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Around 8 o'clock on Dec 6, Anders Karlsson wrote: > > > No, he said he wanted to make Xft applications default to 96 DPI. > > Nothing stopping you from tweaking the Xft.dpi value to what you want it > > to be. > > So should Xft just default to 96dpi and let the Xft.dpi value override > that? Right now, Xft defaults to the "real" display resolution, which I > think we've come to see as almost always the wrong answer (at least as a > default). The problem lies in the Xserver not having the correct DPI set. Let's not try to fix that by breaking the cases where the Xserver has the actual DPI. Mike
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
On Mon, 2004-12-06 at 18:57 +0900, Mike Hommey wrote: > On Mon, Dec 06, 2004 at 08:52:57AM +, Anders Karlsson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > wrote: > > On Mon, 2004-12-06 at 16:20 +0900, Mike Hommey wrote: > > > On Sun, Dec 05, 2004 at 09:19:25PM -0600, Billy Biggs <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > > wrote: > > > > The GNOME system has the nice property that it can be changed without > > > > restarting X. Moving towards systems with this property is a good > > > > thing. GNOME also advertises it in a vendor neutral way (XSETTINGS) and > > > > sets the Xft X resource so that other applications use its DPI value, so > > > > it seems like it is going in the right direction. > > > > > > > > Regardless, my proposal is simply to have Xft always default to 96 > > > > DPI, independent of the DPI value you put in X. > > > > > > Are you telling me you are wanting to force all my Xft applications to > > > use a 96 dpi display while I explicitly configured X to use 112 dpi ? > > > I firmly oppose to that. > > > > No, he said he wanted to make Xft applications default to 96 DPI. > > Nothing stopping you from tweaking the Xft.dpi value to what you want it > > to be. > > Which means I'll have to tweak *2* configurations for *1* DPI. And > fortunately, I don't use several user accounts, otherwise that would be > even more configuration tweaks. Well, yes and no. If you are a normal user, you would not have to tweak anything. If you mess with printing/image manipulating a lot, then you might have to tweak two sets of values, one to tell X what DPI the screen actually is, and one to tell the desktop env what DPI you want the fonts displayed in. What would be nice, is if both values was available to be tweaked, on the fly, in a single config window. I realise full well that what-ever the choice is, some users will feel squeezed because they have to slightly alter how they do things. Perhaps taking the course of action that covers what the most users do is the sanest option here? Rgds -- Anders Karlsson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Trudheim Technology Limited signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
On Mon, Dec 06, 2004 at 11:23:48AM +, Anders Karlsson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Well, yes and no. If you are a normal user, you would not have to tweak > anything. If you mess with printing/image manipulating a lot, then you > might have to tweak two sets of values, one to tell X what DPI the > screen actually is, and one to tell the desktop env what DPI you want > the fonts displayed in. I still fail to see the advantage of having 2 settings of the same thing, being the number of dots per inch. Mike
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
On Mon, 2004-12-06 at 20:44 +0900, Mike Hommey wrote: > On Mon, Dec 06, 2004 at 11:23:48AM +, Anders Karlsson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > wrote: > > Well, yes and no. If you are a normal user, you would not have to tweak > > anything. If you mess with printing/image manipulating a lot, then you > > might have to tweak two sets of values, one to tell X what DPI the > > screen actually is, and one to tell the desktop env what DPI you want > > the fonts displayed in. > > I still fail to see the advantage of having 2 settings of the same > thing, being the number of dots per inch. Golden middle way then, if the X DPI is specified manually in the XF86Config, the Xft.dpi gets set to what X DPI is set to. If X is guessing the DPI, Xft.dpi gets defaulted to 96 dpi? -- Anders Karlsson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Trudheim Technology Limited signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
On Mon, Dec 06, 2004 at 12:17:27PM +, Anders Karlsson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > I still fail to see the advantage of having 2 settings of the same > > thing, being the number of dots per inch. > > Golden middle way then, if the X DPI is specified manually in the > XF86Config, the Xft.dpi gets set to what X DPI is set to. If X is > guessing the DPI, Xft.dpi gets defaulted to 96 dpi? And what if X is guessing correct (which is likely to happen more and more) ? Mike
Bug#284448: xserver-xfree86: xserver (ATI or Radeon something 7500) crashes on variouslaunches of programcs from within X.
Package: xserver-xfree86 Version: 4.3.0.dfsg.1-8 Severity: serious Justification: unknown, X-windows crashes which is unacceptable for a production system The data below are not really applicable, because I've put in another video card. I've spent more than a day re/configuring. Problem is, that various launches (from gnome panel, from terminal) of various programs (rxvt, galeon, wmware) cause the Xserver to crash. (I sincerely hope) it is specific to the ati or radeon video card/driver `ati' or `radeon'. I've used the ati video card happily without problems for over a year. I had to change from stable to sarge because xfree 4.1.0 didn't support the card. Since 3 dec 2004 somehow, X-server crashes. It might have been the upgrade to 4.3.0.dfsg.1-8 at some upgrade to `sarge' in the past, but I can't find any earlier problemless xserver anymore from the archives to test this hypothesis. The data below is not so accurate w.r.t the video card, since that has been replaced in this machine. Sorry about that. The server log (/var/log/XFree86.0.log) ends with a `caught signal 11' exception. -- Package-specific info: Contents of /var/lib/xfree86/X.roster: xserver-xfree86 /etc/X11/X target does not match checksum in /var/lib/xfree86/X.md5sum. X server symlink status: lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 20 2004-12-06 12:38 /etc/X11/X -> /usr/bin/X11/XFree86 -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 1745484 2004-09-28 14:09 /usr/bin/X11/XFree86 Contents of /var/lib/xfree86/XF86Config-4.roster: xserver-xfree86 VGA-compatible devices on PCI bus: :01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV11DDR [GeForce2 MX 100 DDR/200 DDR] (rev b2) /etc/X11/XF86Config-4 unchanged from checksum in /var/lib/xfree86/XF86Config-4.md5sum. XFree86 X server configuration file status: -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 2944 2004-12-06 13:40 /etc/X11/XF86Config-4 Contents of /etc/X11/XF86Config-4: # XF86Config-4 (XFree86 X Window System server configuration file) # # This file was generated by dexconf, the Debian X Configuration tool, using # values from the debconf database. # # Edit this file with caution, and see the XF86Config-4 manual page. # (Type "man XF86Config-4" at the shell prompt.) # # This file is automatically updated on xserver-xfree86 package upgrades *only* # if it has not been modified since the last upgrade of the xserver-xfree86 # package. # # If you have edited this file but would like it to be automatically updated # again, run the following commands as root: # # cp /etc/X11/XF86Config-4 /etc/X11/XF86Config-4.custom # md5sum /etc/X11/XF86Config-4 >/var/lib/xfree86/XF86Config-4.md5sum # dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xfree86 Section "Files" FontPath"unix/:7100"# local font server # if the local font server has problems, we can fall back on these FontPath"/usr/lib/X11/fonts/misc" FontPath"/usr/lib/X11/fonts/cyrillic" FontPath"/usr/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi/:unscaled" FontPath"/usr/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi/:unscaled" FontPath"/usr/lib/X11/fonts/Type1" FontPath"/usr/lib/X11/fonts/CID" FontPath"/usr/lib/X11/fonts/Speedo" FontPath"/usr/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi" FontPath"/usr/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi" EndSection Section "Module" Load"GLcore" Load"bitmap" Load"dbe" Load"ddc" Load"dri" Load"extmod" Load"freetype" Load"glx" Load"int10" Load"record" Load"speedo" Load"type1" Load"vbe" Load"xtt" EndSection Section "InputDevice" Identifier "Generic Keyboard" Driver "keyboard" Option "CoreKeyboard" Option "XkbRules" "xfree86" Option "XkbModel" "pc104" Option "XkbLayout" "us" EndSection Section "InputDevice" Identifier "Configured Mouse" Driver "mouse" Option "CorePointer" Option "Device""/dev/input/mice" Option "Protocol" "ImPS/2" Option "ZAxisMapping" "4 5" EndSection Section "Device" Identifier "Generic Video Card" Driver "nv" EndSection Section "Monitor" Identifier "Generic Monitor" HorizSync 30-92 VertRefresh 50-85 Option "DPMS" EndSection Section "Screen" Identifier "Default Screen" Device "Generic Video Card" Monitor "Generic Monitor" DefaultDepth24 SubSection "Display" Depth 1 Modes "1600x1200" "1280x1024" "1152x864" EndSubSection SubSection "Display" Depth 4 Modes "1600x1200" "1280x10
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
On Mon, 2004-12-06 at 21:47 +0900, Mike Hommey wrote: > On Mon, Dec 06, 2004 at 12:17:27PM +, Anders Karlsson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > wrote: > > > I still fail to see the advantage of having 2 settings of the same > > > thing, being the number of dots per inch. > > > > Golden middle way then, if the X DPI is specified manually in the > > XF86Config, the Xft.dpi gets set to what X DPI is set to. If X is > > guessing the DPI, Xft.dpi gets defaulted to 96 dpi? > > And what if X is guessing correct (which is likely to happen more and > more) ? Not sure on the internals, but add a flag to the XF86Config file stating that you want the X DPI to override Xft.dpi at any cost. I am no developer, so I do not know the work effort required to implement this suggestion. Just a suggestion... -- Anders Karlsson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Trudheim Technology Limited signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
Mike Hommey ([EMAIL PROTECTED]): > On Mon, Dec 06, 2004 at 11:23:48AM +, Anders Karlsson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > wrote: > > Well, yes and no. If you are a normal user, you would not have to > > tweak anything. If you mess with printing/image manipulating a lot, > > then you might have to tweak two sets of values, one to tell X what > > DPI the screen actually is, and one to tell the desktop env what DPI > > you want the fonts displayed in. > > I still fail to see the advantage of having 2 settings of the same > thing, being the number of dots per inch. Mike, I think this is the key point in this argument. A key part of my argument has been the assumption that using the actual "dots per inch" of the display device for rendering the user interface is not useful. I have submitted the following as evidence for this claim: 1. Other operating systems do not use the screen's DPI when rendering fonts. On Windows, there is a different function to determine the real DPI of the display, separate from the DPI used in text rendering. This seems to work well in practice. 2. Font hints are designed for specific font sizes at certain common DPIs. There is value in using a small set of "standard" DPI values for UI rendering. (see http://scanline.ca/dpi/fonts.html) 3. DPI becomes more complicated given different display devices such as data projectors. Originally, I argued that both the DPI values from the X server and from Xft should be the same thing, and that this should be the "canonical DPI" used for UI rendering. As many people have pointed out in this thread, there are other uses for the "real DPI", and furthermore there is some prior art in that these are two separate values on Windows. So, by sticking to separately configured DPI values with Xft makes sense, as does choosing a default canonical value of 96 DPI. -Billy
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
On Mon, Dec 06, 2004 at 08:26:38AM -0600, Billy Biggs <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > 1. Other operating systems do not use the screen's DPI when rendering > fonts. On Windows, there is a different function to determine the > real DPI of the display, separate from the DPI used in text > rendering. This seems to work well in practice. It's not because other systems do stupid things that we must do the same. With such way of thinking, we would end up with a huge amount of crap. > 2. Font hints are designed for specific font sizes at certain common > DPIs. There is value in using a small set of "standard" DPI values > for UI rendering. (see http://scanline.ca/dpi/fonts.html) Then fix font hinting. While differences of 2 dpi seem to make an ugly difference, i'm pretty sure a difference of 10 does not. > 3. DPI becomes more complicated given different display devices such > as data projectors. I don't see why. The only problem that could happen is that when plugging in the new display, X doesn't know instantly that the dpi changed. > Originally, I argued that both the DPI values from the X server and > from Xft should be the same thing, and that this should be the > "canonical DPI" used for UI rendering. As many people have pointed out > in this thread, there are other uses for the "real DPI", and furthermore > there is some prior art in that these are two separate values on > Windows. So, by sticking to separately configured DPI values with Xft > makes sense, as does choosing a default canonical value of 96 DPI. And all I see is that you want to copy what sucks in windows about dpi handling. Mike
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
On Mon, Dec 06, 2004 at 11:49:12PM +0900, Mike Hommey <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > 2. Font hints are designed for specific font sizes at certain common > > DPIs. There is value in using a small set of "standard" DPI values > > for UI rendering. (see http://scanline.ca/dpi/fonts.html) > > Then fix font hinting. While differences of 2 dpi seem to make an ugly > difference, i'm pretty sure a difference of 10 does not. Missing some text here. If hinting was based on nearest good looking dpi, it could consider it instead of real value. Mike
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
Hi Mike, I think I understand your point of view. Please correct me where I am wrong. - You feel that font sizes should be based on how large they will physically be -- the DPI for UI rendering should be the "real" DPI. - You think that having two DPI parameters is silly, and that everything should track the DPI reported by the X server. - You believe that fonts should be improved to look good at _any_ size wherever possible, or at least snap to good looking sizes. I think that's fair enough, I mean, I think the font design problem is somewhat intractable and therefore you'll never get great-looking text at small pixel sizes, but we can happily diagree on this point. I don't want to stop you from configuring your system this way. My priority is solving the practical problem we have today: many Linux users by default are given systems with seemingly random DPI values, and they have to go configure all of their fonts. Can we agree that this is a problem worth solving? Standardizing the default DPI value at the Xft level rather than the X server level seems to have better consensus, so I think it is a good start. I think if you want to promote your method, there are two changes to make: change GNOME to track Xft.dpi if it is set (your first email suggested this), and secondly add a parameter in the X server to seed Xft.dpi from the X server DPI. I do not think my proposal makes things any worse for your setup. Mike Hommey ([EMAIL PROTECTED]): > > 1. Other operating systems do not use the screen's DPI when > > rendering fonts. On Windows, there is a different function to > > determine the real DPI of the display, separate from the DPI > > used in text rendering. This seems to work well in practice. > > It's not because other systems do stupid things that we must do the > same. With such way of thinking, we would end up with a huge amount of > crap. My point was simply that there is a lot of practical evidence that this method works well, especially on the Mac which seems quite popular for desktop publishing. > > 2. Font hints are designed for specific font sizes at certain > > common DPIs. There is value in using a small set of "standard" > > DPI values for UI rendering. (see > > http://scanline.ca/dpi/fonts.html) > > Then fix font hinting. While differences of 2 dpi seem to make an ugly > difference, i'm pretty sure a difference of 10 does not. Agreed, but this does not affect whether or not two values are worse than one. I am not advocating that we make DPI non-configurable. > > 3. DPI becomes more complicated given different display devices > > such as data projectors. > > I don't see why. The only problem that could happen is that when > plugging in the new display, X doesn't know instantly that the dpi > changed. The problem is that these display devices reduce the value of using the "real" DPI for UI rendering. -Billy
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
On Mon, Dec 06, 2004 at 09:38:06AM -0600, Billy Biggs <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > [...] > I think that's fair enough, I mean, I think the font design problem is > somewhat intractable and therefore you'll never get great-looking text > at small pixel sizes, but we can happily diagree on this point. I don't > want to stop you from configuring your system this way. Thanks for understanding my point of view > My priority is solving the practical problem we have today: many > Linux users by default are given systems with seemingly random DPI > values, and they have to go configure all of their fonts. Can we agree > that this is a problem worth solving? Standardizing the default DPI > value at the Xft level rather than the X server level seems to have > better consensus, so I think it is a good start. I can only talk about my experience with X, but the only problems I got were: - badly detected screen size making the dpi to be a default 75dpi. - dpi being forced in ?dm at 100dpi. The second issue is obvious to solve: just stop to force the dpi this way. The first one would need more input. As I understand it (but it's only with my limited experience of it), X fallsback to 75dpi when it can't correctly detect display size. Wouldn't changing this fallback value to 96dpi be a much more pleasant solution ? > [...] > My point was simply that there is a lot of practical evidence that > this method works well, especially on the Mac which seems quite popular > for desktop publishing. Actually the Mac problem is that their quite ridiculous dpi setting is used to justify their pretty bad LCD screens (as per pixel density) > The problem is that these display devices reduce the value of using > the "real" DPI for UI rendering. Actually, X seeded DPI being calculated from pixel size on display, using XRandR to resize the display to the external display resolution will bring a useable and probably expected result. Mike
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
On Mon, Dec 06, 2004 at 11:49:12PM +0900, Mike Hommey > On Mon, Dec 06, 2004 at 08:26:38AM -0600, Billy Biggs > > 3. DPI becomes more complicated given different display devices such > > as data projectors. > > I don't see why. The only problem that could happen is that when > plugging in the new display, X doesn't know instantly that the dpi > changed. I would not like to have my screen projected with 1/2 inch (or 1 cm or whatever galactic leagues) letters high. In fact, I do not want to know the dpi of my projector (which varies according to the distance between it and the wall, anyway). So I would have to lie about the DPI of my projector, should it ever communicate with my X server. I certainly do not want fonts based on a resolution of 5-20 dpi (which is approximately what you get with a projector). So what people want sometimes is measure in pixels (this is the case of the font/widget rendering, and the case when the screen is a projector), and sometimes points/cm/inches (this is the case of the graphics rendering). -- JCD
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
> I would not like to have my screen projected with 1/2 inch (or 1 cm or > whatever galactic leagues) letters high. In fact, I do not want to know > the dpi of my projector (which varies according to the distance between > it and the wall, anyway). > > So I would have to lie about the DPI of my projector, should it ever > communicate with my X server. I certainly do not want fonts based on a > resolution of 5-20 dpi (which is approximately what you get with a > projector). > > So what people want sometimes is measure in pixels (this is the case of > the font/widget rendering, and the case when the screen is a projector), > and sometimes points/cm/inches (this is the case of the graphics rendering). Actually the projector issue is a different one. Nobody wants to use DPI on a projector, for the simple reason there's no projector available with a pixel density such that you could have a decent DPI setting on it. I'm not even sure a projector advertizes its size screen. I'd say people would want to use a projector as if it was a virtual screen of , or even simpler, as a projection of , thus using the already configured DPI. Mike
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
Hi Mike, I think we're getting somewhere. Mike Hommey ([EMAIL PROTECTED]): > > My priority is solving the practical problem we have today: many > > Linux users by default are given systems with seemingly random DPI > > values, and they have to go configure all of their fonts. Can we > > agree that this is a problem worth solving? Standardizing the > > default DPI value at the Xft level rather than the X server level > > seems to have better consensus, so I think it is a good start. > > I can only talk about my experience with X, but the only problems I > got were: > - badly detected screen size making the dpi to be a default 75dpi. > - dpi being forced in ?dm at 100dpi. > > The second issue is obvious to solve: just stop to force the dpi this > way. I think we agree on this. My opinion was that either every display manager set the DPI in their config file (and that be the "one" place) or its done elsewhere. Consensus seems to be to do it elsewhere. > The first one would need more input. As I understand it (but it's only > with my limited experience of it), X fallsback to 75dpi when it can't > correctly detect display size. Wouldn't changing this fallback value > to 96dpi be a much more pleasant solution ? It's a good idea (I would be in support of this for sure). However, my experience supporting users on IRC is that it is rare that X gets this far. Usually DDC provides some values, and X will end up calculating anything between 80 and 133 DPI. If we're talking about patches for the X server, I would like to see it default to 96 DPI, and not use DDC unless explicitly requested in the config file. I think it would be productive to get this changed there, and we could use this as a migration plan. In the mean time, I still think the Xft DPI change is the right thing to do in Debian until we have an X server with these modifications. -Billy
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
On Mon, 2004-12-06 at 17:03 +0100, Jean-Christophe Dubacq wrote: > > I would not like to have my screen projected with 1/2 inch (or 1 cm or > whatever galactic leagues) letters high. In fact, I do not want to know > the dpi of my projector (which varies according to the distance between > it and the wall, anyway). I realise that a lot of people in the course of their work will have to use projectors and hence want that case taken into account. However, as you rightly say, the projectors DPI matters little in real life. Most projectors insist on being fed 800x600 or 1024x768 screen size (the ones I have come in contact with anyhow). > So I would have to lie about the DPI of my projector, should it ever > communicate with my X server. I certainly do not want fonts based on a > resolution of 5-20 dpi (which is approximately what you get with a > projector). > > So what people want sometimes is measure in pixels (this is the case of > the font/widget rendering, and the case when the screen is a projector), > and sometimes points/cm/inches (this is the case of the graphics rendering). Perhaps I am a bit partial, but I would very much like the system to take type-setting, graphics rendering and printing heavily into account. Rgds, -- Anders Karlsson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Trudheim Technology Limited signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
On Mon, Dec 06, 2004 at 10:30:22AM -0600, Billy Biggs <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > I think we agree on this. My opinion was that either every display > manager set the DPI in their config file (and that be the "one" place) > or its done elsewhere. Consensus seems to be to do it elsewhere. Well, it has to be somewhere else, otherwise, we end up with the DPI detected by X or set in the conffile being overridden, which is not really what one would expect. > > The first one would need more input. As I understand it (but it's only > > with my limited experience of it), X fallsback to 75dpi when it can't > > correctly detect display size. Wouldn't changing this fallback value > > to 96dpi be a much more pleasant solution ? > > It's a good idea (I would be in support of this for sure). However, > my experience supporting users on IRC is that it is rare that X gets > this far. Usually DDC provides some values, and X will end up > calculating anything between 80 and 133 DPI. If we're talking about > patches for the X server, I would like to see it default to 96 DPI, and > not use DDC unless explicitly requested in the config file. Well, if the user gets something 80 and 133, i would say they probably got the right value. So what is wrong ? Probably the user not being accustomed to the fact that the dpi setting actually works. I've myself been using a 75dpi setting for a *long* time, going up to editing the ?dm file to use 75 instead of the 100 default value. And now I think about it, that was due to the fact that in my opinion, the 75dpi xfonts were much pleasant to my eye than the 100dpi xfonts. So what ? my old habit of ancient non ttf antialiased fonts made me use for quite some time some inaccurate setting. Then I got a clue and used the real dpi value of my monitor. My point is people are probably still used to old stuff, and can't just realize that the new setting they have is the actual correct one. The typical error is using font sizes they're used to, being something in-between 11 an 13pt, while the one they really want would be 8 or 9pt. > I think it would be productive to get this changed there, and we could > use this as a migration plan. In the mean time, I still think the Xft > DPI change is the right thing to do in Debian until we have an X server > with these modifications. I think except the default fallback value, there's nothing to change but people habits. Mike
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
Mike Hommey ([EMAIL PROTECTED]): > > It's a good idea (I would be in support of this for sure). However, > > my experience supporting users on IRC is that it is rare that X gets > > this far. Usually DDC provides some values, and X will end up > > calculating anything between 80 and 133 DPI. If we're talking about > > patches for the X server, I would like to see it default to 96 DPI, > > and not use DDC unless explicitly requested in the config file. > > Well, if the user gets something 80 and 133, i would say they probably > got the right value. So what is wrong ? Probably the user not being > accustomed to the fact that the dpi setting actually works. Hi Mike, I think I've made a pretty strong argument about why using the real DPI for fonts is not a good idea. In summary: - Font hints are not designed for small pixel sizes at arbitrary DPIs. I have shown this via screenshots which I posted. - GNOME defaults to a 10 point font for the application font. My experience dictates that users find this too small on their autodetected 80-DPI screens, and too large at their autodetected 133-DPI screens. - Other operating systems do not use the real DPI of the display, and there does not seem to be a strong movement towards having this changed. I can continue to try to back up my claims, however I think that at this point it should be up to you to provide supporting evidence. -Billy
Bug#126519: Verify your order J746115
but one that is not highly charged. It is on a level of quiet competitionexecs used to show up at conferences and tell everyone thatand later than the era of Aesop, rightfully bears his name, This region is mostly ocean to the south, with a small plain surrounded by this region is almost completely surrounded by mountain ranges. However, theA MAN who had traveled in foreign lands boasted very much, on So, armed with airplane tickets, ride plans, and contingency plans, I ventured the program and the creative abilities of the artist monitoring a chaotic overflow of characters, something that should not happen. After the movie they put in "City Slickers". This was a very good movie; I their mutual protection, went out into the forest to hunt. They Fitpro Locksmith, near the Dune Portal, will sell you a yellow key. to bypass such government censoring as we were subjected to land. But here, we had some really nice houses, arranged as if it were just computer in every household for that reason alone would be worth least having enough control so as to be safe from slavery by any other species. the old man rest his weary limbs." Upon this the old man made his power lines, computer terminals, and the attempt to cober up systems where I was once blind to them, in every facet of our road, you may find OrcCon and the Circus. Visits to the Circus can help you virtual reality, which is to say that they sit you in a box that blocks out that had been done. Consequently, there could be a trend that order. This may be done to move a wounded character out of harm's way, move a in D1. The opening day of the convention is May 27th, so you may see references them to pieces in my fury, when I turn into a wolf." At the same know about this incident right now," said Gentile, "I'd be willing to recommend Orations by Poggio in the monastery of St. Gall A.D. 1416. M. grow and thrive. They simply want the earth as a kind of strategic point in should be considered as a groundwork for a similar type of any skill or job could be performed with Virtual Reality. It here is a method to advance even more quickly. Beat them once, turn to the west, agreement and pact with the Zeta Greys, even though there were warnings by the
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
Around 12 o'clock on Dec 6, Billy Biggs wrote: > - Font hints are not designed for small pixel sizes at arbitrary > DPIs. I have shown this via screenshots which I posted. I don't know of any hinting technology which cares about DPI. But, TrueType fonts usually contain delta hints which adjust glyphs at specific pixel sizes. The set of pixel sizes so hinted is generally small, and limited to what is likely to appear in a typical Windows environment. What you're likely seeing is the difference between a size for which delta hints are available and a size at which only the general hints are used. This suggests that "typical" point sizes would be best rendered if they mapped to the same pixel sizes as they do under Windows. -keith pgphZ6bOsPmF9.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
Hi everyone, What i think this discussion boils down to, is the question "Is there a standard way to relate a granularity-angle to the fontcharacteristic that is (for example in xlfd) called 'dpi' ?". If there is , i would like to know. If there isn't, this discussion belongs on -user . have fun Siward
xprt-xprintorg taking over xprt: now or later?
Hi X StrikeForce, We agreed with Fabio in recent past that you will drop xprt completely from "xfree86", and that I would take it over via xprt-xprintorg. We need to coordinate this so you remove your xprt before I provide mine. The plan is that I will rename xprt-xprintorg to xprt, and xprt-xprintorg will become a dummy package which depends on xprt. I need your advice on the timing. Is this a transition you want to make now before sarge goes out, while X is still xfree86? Or do you want us to wait until after sarge once you've brought X.org into Debian? I guess we can do it now. xprt (xfree86) does not work and Fabio was already prepared to remove it now before sarge. The only reason we'd really want to keep it would be to inspire people to fix it in xfree86, but history over the last year and a half has put xfree86's codebase into a somewhat different context... Also, I have a prerelease upstream version of Xprint (1.0alpha1), based on X.org 6.8.2. Roland upstream recommends we put it into sarge, it has considerable improvements over the current Xprint. I've tested that it works on top of our current xfree86. I think it could make good timing to put it into debian sarge as xprt, removing the xfree86 version. So please let me know if now is the time to trash xfree86's xprt, replacing it fully with "my" version. Drew p.s. CC: me if you would, I'm not subscribed to debian-x.
Re: xprt-xprintorg taking over xprt: now or later?
On Tue, Dec 07, 2004 at 11:09:31AM +1100, Drew Parsons wrote: > I guess we can do it now. xprt (xfree86) does not work and Fabio was > already prepared to remove it now before sarge. Of course, neither does xprt-xprintorg, but that's a minor quibble. :) Does *anything* besides Mozilla care about whether or not it exists? From a user's perspective, I can't imagine that it's at all important to replace the one with the other for Sarge. Checking reverse depends... no, nothing other than Mozilla and friends deps on it, and they don't even dep on it, they only recommend it. So who cares, really? Packages that want it, will already bring it in. > Also, I have a prerelease upstream version of Xprint (1.0alpha1), based > on X.org 6.8.2. Roland upstream recommends we put it into sarge, it has > considerable improvements over the current Xprint. Oh, you mean that this one actually works correctly? -- Marc Wilson | Kissing your hand may make you feel very good, [EMAIL PROTECTED] | but a diamond and sapphire bracelet lasts for ever. | -- Anita Loos, "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes"
Re: DPI, font size, and Debian
On Mon, Dec 06, 2004 at 12:55:20PM -0600, Billy Biggs <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > - Font hints are not designed for small pixel sizes at arbitrary > DPIs. I have shown this via screenshots which I posted. See Keith's answer > - GNOME defaults to a 10 point font for the application font. My > experience dictates that users find this too small on their > autodetected 80-DPI screens, and too large at their autodetected > 133-DPI screens. That can be the result of 2 things: - Actual DPI not being correctly detected by X, but I really doubt it. - Bad user feedback. Users have been used to badly set DPIs, leading to several different things. One of which is the following: 10pt font at 133dpi, yes, is smaller than 10pt at 100dpi on the same screen at the same resolution. And 10pt font at 80dpi, yes, is smaller than 10pt at 100dpi on the same screen at the same resolution. Coming back to my own bad habits case, with having 75dpi on a 15" at a resolution of 1400x1050 , I got used to *small* fonts. *Everybody*, when looking at my screen, told me "isn't it too small" ? And I usually answered "no, that's fine". Now I'm using a 13.3" screen at 1280x800, with 112dpi and 10pt fonts, they are, yes, much much bigger than what I was using before, but actually, it's much better now. Since then, I reinstalled the 15" laptop (giving a try to Ubuntu at the same time ;) ) and set the adequate DPI, set the fonts to 10pt, and guess what... it gives me the same size for fonts as the 13.3" does, which was what i expected. > - Other operating systems do not use the real DPI of the display, and > there does not seem to be a strong movement towards having this > changed. Again, it's not because other OS are stupid that we have to do the same. Mike
Bug#116507:
Want a cheap Watch? http://fvh.hensi.com
