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wallcraft · 10-20-2007, 01:09 AM

Fonts in X11 really suck. Modern applications generally get round this by allowing font selection via menus, which automatically fill with available fonts. FBReader works that way for example, as do all "heavy weight" terminal programs. Really old X11 apps require you to use the XLFD, e.g. -misc-fixed-medium-r-normal--13-120-75-75-c-60-iso8859-1 for the standard X11 "fixed" font. A typical terminal program these days will still accept an XLFD (probably with "*" for some fields), but have alternative simpler ways of specifying fonts too. Unfortunately, the alternative mrxvt has chosen is "freetype fonts" which are not linked into the iLiad mrxvt.

This is all a long-winded way of saying that in order to specify a font to mrxvt its XLFD is needed. The program xlsfonts will list all available fonts with their XLFDs, but I can't find it on the iLiad. So far every XLFD I have tried has returned "mrxvt: can't load font". The fc-list program reports that Bitstream Vera Sans Mono and Nimbus Mono L fonts are available, but I have yet to construct a XLFD for these fonts that works in mrxvt. The XLFD stuff is so picky that I can't tell if I am screwing up the XLFD's of if mrxvt is buggy and only works with the default font.

Any suggestions? If I was a C/C++ programmer I think I might try porting Xfce-Terminal. This depends on Xfce libraries (among others), but was the basis of osso-xterm for the Nokia 770/N800 which are comparable in some ways to the iLiad. However, mrxvt is probably "good enough" if the font issue can be fixed.

With the default font, the following (e.g. in run.sh) gives a much better setup than the default:

Code:

./mrxvt -geometry 112x44-40-340 -sr

This is 112 characters wide and 44 rows high (filling most of the screen above the keyboard), and -sr puts the scrollbar on the right (vs on the left by default).

10-20-2007, 01:09 AM	#4
wallcraft reader Posts: 6,975 Karma: 5183568 Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: Mississippi, USA Device: Kindle 3, Kobo Glo HD	Fonts in X11 really suck. Modern applications generally get round this by allowing font selection via menus, which automatically fill with available fonts. FBReader works that way for example, as do all "heavy weight" terminal programs. Really old X11 apps require you to use the XLFD, e.g. -misc-fixed-medium-r-normal--13-120-75-75-c-60-iso8859-1 for the standard X11 "fixed" font. A typical terminal program these days will still accept an XLFD (probably with "*" for some fields), but have alternative simpler ways of specifying fonts too. Unfortunately, the alternative mrxvt has chosen is "freetype fonts" which are not linked into the iLiad mrxvt. This is all a long-winded way of saying that in order to specify a font to mrxvt its XLFD is needed. The program xlsfonts will list all available fonts with their XLFDs, but I can't find it on the iLiad. So far every XLFD I have tried has returned "mrxvt: can't load font". The fc-list program reports that Bitstream Vera Sans Mono and Nimbus Mono L fonts are available, but I have yet to construct a XLFD for these fonts that works in mrxvt. The XLFD stuff is so picky that I can't tell if I am screwing up the XLFD's of if mrxvt is buggy and only works with the default font. Any suggestions? If I was a C/C++ programmer I think I might try porting Xfce-Terminal. This depends on Xfce libraries (among others), but was the basis of osso-xterm for the Nokia 770/N800 which are comparable in some ways to the iLiad. However, mrxvt is probably "good enough" if the font issue can be fixed. With the default font, the following (e.g. in run.sh) gives a much better setup than the default: Code: ./mrxvt -geometry 112x44-40-340 -sr This is 112 characters wide and 44 rows high (filling most of the screen above the keyboard), and -sr puts the scrollbar on the right (vs on the left by default).