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The new TrueType interpreter in FreeType 2.7.0

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Re: The new TrueType interpreter in FreeType 2.7.0

#42

Post by strcat »

boondaburrah wrote: post #17

No. No stop. I install MacType, which hacks windows's font rendering and replaces it with freetype, SPECIFICALLY so I can /avoid/ cleartype's ugly rendering on windows. I don't want it to invade my linux/mac as well!

It's not a mandatory feature. It provides options that it didn't have before without having lost anything.

Re: The new TrueType interpreter in FreeType 2.7.0

#43

Post by premium-concern »

derefr wrote: post #38
honkhonkpants wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A randomly selected unix system has a 99.999% chance of being a Linux system. Nobody cares about the other variants except for their own developers and a few historians and hobbyists. For that matter I have no idea why you think freetype is even unix software. It builds and runs on numerous non-unix platforms.

A randomly-selected UNIX workstation has a pretty high chance of being an OSX system, I'd think. UNIX servers are 99.999% Linux, though, yes.

"workstation" ... "OSX"

Yeah, sure! :-)

Re: The new TrueType interpreter in FreeType 2.7.0

#44

Post by kccqzy »

mrob wrote: post #3

"Switching to the new mode might take some getting used to though, so if you think your fonts are suddenly fat, fuzzy or weird, give your brain some time to adjust." This is true, and IMO it's the reason font rendering is much less important than people think. When I got a new pair of glasses I disabled font anti-aliasing to make the edges as sharp as possible. I did this so I could more quickly learn to focus my eye…

Yes the most legible font is the one you're used to, but do we want to condition the next generation into thinking low dpi bitmapped fonts are the best? The thing is, we need to set the software defaults to be most pleasing to a population who has never had any prior experience. And IMHO, the print industry has figured that out centuries ago.

Re: The new TrueType interpreter in FreeType 2.7.0

#45

Post by [deleted] »

zbuf wrote: post #14
mrob wrote: post #3

"Switching to the new mode might take some getting used to though, so if you think your fonts are suddenly fat, fuzzy or weird, give your brain some time to adjust." This is true, and IMO it's the reason font rendering is much less important than people think. When I got a new pair of glasses I disabled font anti-aliasing to make the edges as sharp as possible. I did this so I could more quickly learn to focus my eye…

> The most legible font is the one you're used to. Yes, and in my case on Linux I switched off hinting a long time ago (but retained anti-aliasing) We even did it on our network at work by default as users liked the fonts when they were more "Mac like". Personally I have never understood the whole font hinting thing. It seems rather unscientific and the result is that fonts look fundamentally different at slight size…

[deleted]

Re: The new TrueType interpreter in FreeType 2.7.0

#46

Post by prima-facie »

Subpixel hinting mode can be chosen by setting the right value in your environment, for example /etc/environment or ~/.pam_environment

Available settings:

      FT2_SUBPIXEL_HINTING=0  # Classic mode (default in 2.6)
      FT2_SUBPIXEL_HINTING=1  # Infinality mode
      FT2_SUBPIXEL_HINTING=2  # Minimal mode (default in 2.7)

Re: The new TrueType interpreter in FreeType 2.7.0

#47

Post by rossy »

Longhanks wrote: post #10

What? As someone who hates Windows' Font rendering, why would you want this? The OS X font rendering is awesome, on Linux, Infinality can be tweaked to look even better, but windows? It's hideous, inconsistent and terrible to change...

I don't want to defend Windows' font rendering, because I hate it too, but (as far as I understand) the core idea behind these changes is good. AGG's article on text rasterization[1] also recommends that renderers ignore horizontal hinting and it has some demo images that look quite good. Also, a lot of fonts are designed for Windows' style of hinting.

[1]: http://www.antigrain.com/research/font_rasterization/index.h...

Re: The new TrueType interpreter in FreeType 2.7.0

#49

Post by int_19h »

Longhanks wrote: post #10

What? As someone who hates Windows' Font rendering, why would you want this? The OS X font rendering is awesome, on Linux, Infinality can be tweaked to look even better, but windows? It's hideous, inconsistent and terrible to change...

This preference is subjective. There are valid reasons to prefer OS X rendering (scaling is proportional), but there are also valid reasons to prefer Windows rendering (stems are less blurry).

Re: The new TrueType interpreter in FreeType 2.7.0

#50

Post by stupidcar »

mrob wrote: post #3

"Switching to the new mode might take some getting used to though, so if you think your fonts are suddenly fat, fuzzy or weird, give your brain some time to adjust." This is true, and IMO it's the reason font rendering is much less important than people think. When I got a new pair of glasses I disabled font anti-aliasing to make the edges as sharp as possible. I did this so I could more quickly learn to focus my eye…

“If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.” - Kurt Cobain.
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