Summary of Modified Fonts

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by ShellShock

Your are a star sir! That works for me, and also fixes all the other broken side-loaded fonts, regardless of locale. Have some freshly baked karma.

I think the Kobo 2.4.0 firmware looks for a font file in the following format:

Font Family Name-Font Subfamily Name.ttf

Font Family Name must have the same spacing as in the font itself.

Font Subfamily Name is normally one of:

Bold
Italic
BoldItalic
Regular

You do not need a space in "BoldItalic", even if there is one in the font file ("Bold Italic").

.otf file extension is also supported.

Firmware 2.1.5 would find a matching font file even if there were no spaces in the file name but there were in the Font Family Name within the font. For some reason after 2.1.5 this was changed so that the spacing had to be the same for the font to be found.

Some of the built-in fonts are still broken e.g., Avenir and Kobo Nickel, presumably because the internal font file is actually called "KoboNickel-Regular.ttf" etc.

You can also use i b and z as in the builtin Georgia font where the filenames are georgia.ttf, georgiab.ttf, georgiai.ttf and georgiaz.ttf. The -Regular is not needed but I use it just to keep the file naming convention consistent. At this time, I can't open the built-in font files to see what their font family names are since they report as not being a valid font file.

Regards,
David

[tshering]

Originally Posted by DNSB

At this time, I can't open the built-in font files to see what their font family names are since they report as not being a valid font file.

I'm not sure what you mean by "this time". Do you refer to the current FW? Anyway, the last FW with "valid" font files was kobo3-upgrade-1.9.17.

[PeterT]

If you extract the fonts from the Kobo supplied images, they appear to be obfuscated in some manner.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by tshering

I'm not sure what you mean by "this time". Do you refer to the current FW? Anyway, the last FW with "valid" font files was kobo3-upgrade-1.9.17.

The last version I had that showed valid font files was 2.0.4. The next release I used was 2.1.1 which had the obfuscated font files so any attempt to open/view them errored out.

Regards,
David

[tshering]

Originally Posted by DNSB

The last version I had that showed valid font files was 2.0.4. The next release I used was 2.1.1 which had the obfuscated font files so any attempt to open/view them errored out.

Good we talked about it. I incorrectly remembered that obfuscation started with 2.0.0 (and never had 2.0.4). I even checked yesterday, but evidently mixed up the folders. So there is actually an unobfuscated version of the Japanese fonts. Thank you for this information.

[roger64]

Hi

A new KoboGlo user from this morning (at long last, they delivered...). Version 2.4.0 of February 2013. My previous device was a PRS-505 which died of overwork three weeks ago after four and a half years of intensive service.

As far as the fonts are concerned, I am overall very happy with the KoboGlo offer (Amasis, Avenir, Caecilia, Georgia, Gil Sans, Kobo Nickel, Malabar, Gothic MB101, Ryumin, Open Dyslexic). I will add some other fonts that I will place in a fonts folder as advised.

embedded fonts

One minus is that I cannot read properly my own EPUB books which make use of embedded fonts, even when I select "Document par défaut" (default doc). I get a lot of strains on the screen. Of course, if I switch to any Kobo "factory" font, it gets better, but I still do not get a correct display of the "Linux Libertine Display" font that I use for titles and dropcaps because it seems that Kobo does not provide a replacement for it. I have read that this is an unresolved Kobo bug and I just can confirm it.

The display of my PDF books (published in 6 inches format) with exactly the same embedded fonts and dropcaps, on the other hand is just perfect.

I will report later with my other fonts trials (including ttf and otf fonts).

semibold

I have had the opportunity to open a Kindle set of fonts. I remarked that, contrary to the Kobo set, all the regular fonts were in fact semibold. Of course, they look probably darker on the screen but I consider this not to be needed.

I will try to use semibold fonts to replace not regular but bold fonts (and semibold italic to replace bold italic)

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by roger64

semibold

I have had the opportunity to open a Kindle set of fonts. I remarked that, contrary to the Kobo set, all the regular fonts were in fact semibold. Of course, they look probably darker on the screen but I consider this not to be needed.

I will try to use semibold fonts to replace not regular but bold fonts (and semibold italic to replace bold italic)

The Chris SIL fonts as modified by JSWolf are a heavier font which, in my opinion, does look better on the eInk display especially in poorer lighting. I've found that many of the standard PC fonts which look good on my laptop or desktop display look too light on the Kobo. Unfortunately, the font tweaking capability of the Kobo only applies to the built-in fonts at this time.

Regards,
David

[Anak]

Originally Posted by DNSB

The Chris SIL fonts as modified by JSWolf are a heavier font which, in my opinion, does look better on the eInk display especially in poorer lighting. I've found that many of the standard PC fonts which look good on my laptop or desktop display look too light on the Kobo. Unfortunately, the font tweaking capability of the Kobo only applies to the built-in fonts at this time.

Regards,
David

Originally Posted by roger64

semibold

I have had the opportunity to open a Kindle set of fonts. I remarked that, contrary to the Kobo set, all the regular fonts were in fact semibold. Of course, they look probably darker on the screen but I consider this not to be needed.

I will try to use semibold fonts to replace not regular but bold fonts (and semibold italic to replace bold italic)

Yes, I agree that a slightly heavier font looks better on e-ink screens.
If available choose a font family with a "medium" (thickness 500) font to replace the regular and italic styles. Medium fonts are slightly bigger than regular (400) and thinner than semibold (600). This gives good results.

Optical size
BTW, the Minion Pro font scales poorly on my KT. Giving awfull looking, uneven letter heights.
Replacing Minion Pro with Minion Pro Subhead gives much better scaling results.
When modifying fonts, first test which optical font size looks best on your Touch or Glo to get the best results.