[SOLVED easily] Debian fonts still not as nice as Ubuntu's

[ivanovnegro]

Ok, not a problem for me, really, but I find Debian Testing even more polished as this Mint thing. Just saying. What is so hard about running the real thing??

[rorschach]

Linux Mint Debian Edition IS the real thing. They difference is that they add some custom software, but I've removed the Mint repos and replaced them entirely with Debian's official repos.
Why use Mint instead of vanilla Debian? Because Mint provides a nice live testing USB image. It's stable (the adjective, not the Debian branch) and lets me have a functioning OS as soon as I install. I don't have to worry about something being not quite right in the testing repos when I try to get everything up and going. No weird installer issues, no having to navigate Debian's horrible website to hunt down the specific combination of stuff that I need to make a live USB. Multimedia works right out of the box, too, which is a nice bonus. Spares me having to add the repos, update, add the key, update, then select each individual package to install, then wait for apt to do its thing. It's not impossible to start from plain Debian, but it's a much nicer experience starting from LMDE.

I know that anything that isn't purely Debian get's totally trashed on these forums, but there's an honest answer for anyone who cares for it.

[Roken]

Gotta say, I'm a "pure Debian" user, having migtrated to pure Debian from, oh oh, LMDE, and I have to say I'm appalled at the attitude of some of the users here.

I'm done with this forum.

[62chevy]

Linux Mint Debian Edition IS the real thing. They difference is that they add some custom software, but I've removed the Mint repos and replaced them entirely with Debian's official repos.
Why use Mint instead of vanilla Debian? Because Mint provides a nice live testing USB image. It's stable (the adjective, not the Debian branch) and lets me have a functioning OS as soon as I install. I don't have to worry about something being not quite right in the testing repos when I try to get everything up and going. No weird installer issues, no having to navigate Debian's horrible website to hunt down the specific combination of stuff that I need to make a live USB. Multimedia works right out of the box, too, which is a nice bonus. Spares me having to add the repos, update, add the key, update, then select each individual package to install, then wait for apt to do its thing. It's not impossible to start from plain Debian, but it's a much nicer experience starting from LMDE.

I know that anything that isn't purely Debian get's totally trashed on these forums, but there's an honest answer for anyone who cares for it.

I don't see a problem with the way you installed Debian. LMDE does install all the codex and non-free drivers that you need that Debian does not. That is one of the reasons I recommend SalineOS to people that like Xfce. It's even closer to Debian than LMDE is but because they have a bunch of scripts that are not anointed by Debian it's not Debian according to some of the Blue-Blood Debian users. The funny thing is all those script apt-get all the non-free drivers and codex from the Debian repository.

[vbrummond]

Why use Mint instead of vanilla Debian?

Adhd?

Because Mint provides a nice live testing USB image.

http://www.debian.org/CD/live/

It's stable

Stable:
1. Resistant to change of position or condition; not easily moved or disturbed.
2. A distro that is not LMDE aka Mint Debian Ripoff Rolling

lets me have a functioning OS as soon as I install

I could slightly agree with this. Though the full Debian Gnome desktop is quite usable, especially installed from the live image, the other desktops require some software installed.

I don't have to worry about something being not quite right in the testing repos when I try to get everything up and going.

It comes with the territory Testing not being a released form of Debian.

No weird installer issues

Lolok

no having to navigate Debian's horrible website to hunt down the specific combination of stuff that I need to make a live USB.

Yeah its not easy on the eyes, simple, and web standards compliant. Unlike that annoying spammy green fest.

Multimedia works right out of the box, too, which is a nice bonus.

As far as I know the Debian live image works for everything except very new wma/wmv, encoding x264, and libdvdcss.. Which are all easy to install.

Spares me having to add the repos, update, add the key, update, then select each individual package to install, then wait for apt to do its thing. It's not impossible to start from plain Debian, but it's a much nicer experience starting from LMDE.

You can install a weekly generated image of Testing.

I know that anything that isn't purely Debian get's totally trashed on these forums, but there's an honest answer for anyone who cares for it.

Aww. Well that is not quite true. I like Mepis, Knoppix. I dislike Ubuntu and LMDE aka The one that is a clone of Debian instead of a clone of Ubuntu.

[62chevy]

Aww. Well that is not quite true. I like Mepis, Knoppix. I dislike Ubuntu and LMDE aka The one that is a clone of Debian instead of a clone of Ubuntu.

I don't like Ubuntu at all, LMDE isn't all that bad but the menus do suck. The worst part about both Distros are the trolls that show up to start a fight and when they get one run crying that everyone on this board is mean.

[ivanovnegro]

The worst part about both Distros are the trolls that show up to start a fight and when they get one run crying that everyone on this board is mean.

+1

[vbrummond]

I have few real problems with Mint other than its vast legion of ill informed fanboys. It tends to bring out the inner troll in me.

[ivanovnegro]

I think the real Mint users are just fine, just saying. And I think the real fanboys are there, not here. We somehow get just the newcomers of Mint or Ubuntu thinking the Debian forum is their way to go. What I cannot understand, some people here are really helping out and then you recieve just badmouthing because you say why maybe not going to ask the Mint specific things on their forums, what is the problem about it?

I personally do not have any problem with Mint or whatever users and I appreciate even the Debian direction of Mint. I know some LMDE users are Debian Forum members and they are not "ill informed", at least in my opinion.

I say this e.g.:

"Support the distro you use and you will get also adequate support from them!"

And see what we get here:

Whorseschack.Great. A rocket scientist stating LMDE is not Debian. What is it ? Leopard ? SUSE ? Looking at the repos I'd say it's the same as what you are running........uNLESS You have Winbloze 98 S.P. 43.

It is a nice example of just going straight into confrontation.

[rorschach]

It is a nice example of just going straight into confrontation.

You should see how this thread started. All I did is ask how to get my fonts to look better, and a whole bunch of people got all sorts of butthurt. This forum is notorious for being a lousy community, and it's probably because of stuff like this.

[vbrummond]

Oh, I should mention to the person I was kind of semi rudely contradicting above. Apologies, I am not numbering you among the fanboys.

[aaralynatikah]

I use 6 distro linux in My computer (Debian / ubuntu / slackware / Fedora / Mandriva / and BackTrack) + FreeBSD + Windows 7 ! So it’s 8 OS! If I'm tired of using one OS that I have, I'll switch to another OS! but I never blame the OS that I have if I get trouble. If You do not want to use it, Do not use, but if You want to use it, prepared to accept all the risks and remember do not ever insult / blame between one (OS) with another (OS) ! all distributions (OS) have advantages and disadvantages of each, nothing is 100% perfect, if you want (OS) is perfect for you. May I suggest to use the LFS (Linux From Scratch) and make your own distro!! Thank you!

[el_koraco]

It is a nice example of just going straight into confrontation.

You should see how this thread started. All I did is ask how to get my fonts to look better, and a whole bunch of people got all sorts of butthurt. This forum is notorious for being a lousy community, and it's probably because of stuff like this.

Code: Select all

su -c 'dpkg-reconfigure fontconfig-config'

answer Native, Automatic, Yes

Code: Select all

su -c 'dpkg-reconfigure fontconfig'

touch .fonts.conf
nano .fonts.conf

paste in:

Code: Select all

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<!DOCTYPE fontconfig SYSTEM "fonts.dtd">
<fontconfig>
 <match target="font" >
  <edit mode="assign" name="hinting" >
   <bool>true</bool>
  </edit>
 </match>
 <match target="font" >
  <edit mode="assign" name="hintstyle" >
   <const>hintslight</const>
  </edit>
 </match>
 <match target="font" >
  <edit mode="assign" name="rgba" >
   <const>rgb</const>
  </edit>
 </match>
 <match target="font" >
  <edit mode="assign" name="antialias" >
   <bool>true</bool>
  </edit>
 </match>
<match target="font">
   <edit mode="assign" name="lcdfilter">
   <const>lcddefault</const>
   </edit>
 </match>
<match target="pattern">
   <edit name="dpi" mode="assign">
   <double>96</double></edit>
</match>
</fontconfig>

for lolz, create, or paste into .Xdefaults:

Code: Select all

Xft.autohint: 0
Xft.antialias: 1
Xft.hinting: true
Xft.hintstyle: hintslight
Xft*dpi: 96
Xft.rgba: rgb
Xft.lcdfilter: lcddefault

Log out, log back in. I actually find Debian's fonts to be slightly better than Ubuntu's with the recent versions of libcairo2, libxft and libfreetype6 (make sure you have all these installed). Get back in case we need to tidy it up some more.

[rorschach]

Log out, log back in. I actually find Debian's fonts to be slightly better than Ubuntu's with the recent versions of libcairo2, libxft and libfreetype6 (make sure you have all these installed). Get back in case we need to tidy it up some more.

The fonts were OK after copying Ubuntu's /etc/fonts/ into Debian's. But, I figured I'd go ahead and try what you posted to see if the fonts could be improved even further. Unfortunately, it seems to have ruined the rendering of some fonts. You'll notice that the GNOME interface and most web pages (see the Wikipedia example) still render fine.

[el_koraco]

Run the first command, and choose Autohinter, Always, No in that case (the last one has to do with bitmap fonts, dunno if you use those), or Native, Always, No. Or just cp the whole /etc7fonts from Ubuntu again.

[mrnegitoro]

Perhaps give this a try?

http://www.techytalk.info/font-smoothin ... in-ubuntu/

[grege]

......
Log out, log back in. I actually find Debian's fonts to be slightly better than Ubuntu's with the recent versions of libcairo2, libxft and libfreetype6 (make sure you have all these installed). Get back in case we need to tidy it up some more.

Thank you for this answer. I had not had any font troubles for ages then last week I had to re-install from scratch (Wheezy) on a new drive and suddenly found crappy fonts, especially in Chrome and Chromium. After reading copious quantities of out of date rubbish I found you post and, just like that, fonts fixed. I have it in my bookmarks in Chrome for future reference.