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Updated And Unified Font HOWTO
avibrazil writes "A new Linux Font HOWTO was published with way more practical info for modern systems. The still-useful parts of the two former Font HOWTOs from TLDP were unified in this new one, to be a definitive one-stop-shop for Linux font solutions."
$ emerge kde
... I messed with the nice KDE control app to configure font smoothing... a few seconds later and my fonts looked fine. I'm a linux newb, ... but what's the big deal here? Everything looks fine...everything appears anti-aliased and pleasent to the eye. I know in other distros from years back that this wasn't the case...but it works now, and didn't take me any real effort to get it working... Is there some mystery here that I accidently stumbled upon, or is this just a problem that has been solved that someone feels necessary to write a really long HOWTO on? Or am I just an idiot? (I'm sure someone will reply with such an answer...this is Slashdot!)
A few beers and one long period of REM later (ok...maybe two), KDE was installed
It does seem that if I *am* an idiot, that I shouldn't be expected to follow a 13 step program to fix it. 12 steps, and I wouldn't have been drinking the beer in the first place...I would have just had a couple of really long restful naps while Gentoo, emerge, the compilers, and whatever other magic occurs while those endless make screens flash up on my screen.
"God is dead!" - Nietzsche
"Nietzsche is dead!" - God
There's no howto, it already works!
Oh damn, there goes my karma.
Assuming that the US doesn't extend patents past 20 years, adopting the Apple method of hinting truetype fonts should be legal as of May 2009/2012
Patent US5155805: Method and apparatus for moving control points in displaying digital typeface on raster output devices. Filed on May, 8 1989
Patent US5159668: Method and apparatus for manipulating outlines in improving digital typeface on raster output devices. Filed on May, 8 1989
Patent US5325479: Method and apparatus for moving control points in displaying digital typeface on raster output devices. Filed on May 28, 1992
A pizza of radius z and thickness a has a volume of pi z z a
Actually, according to Microsoft's licensing agreement, these fonts are only free for use with Microsoft Windows.
It does not matter if you have a Windows license or not, as the fonts are only to be used within Windows itself.
This was covered on Slashdot before, months or years ago in fact. Why won't the keepers of the new FAQ admit as much and let their readers decide what they want to do?
Of course, the legality of installing Microsoft fonts if you haven't a Windows license is doubtful.
HPUX 11.0, and probably 11.11, come with the ubiquitous ms truetype fonts. They also come with a license that boils down to "distribute these however you want, as long as this license file is included." I believe the license that HP uses is one of the earliest that microsoft ever applied to those fonts, long before they realized that linux and XFree86 would ride along for free. If I were at work, I'd post the actual text of the license. But I'm not, so you'll just have to believe me. You should believe me, it is something I have double, triple and quadruple checked because everytime this discussion comes up about MS's license of those fonts I start to have doubts and go and re-read the HP license again.
I think, to be on the safe side, next time I remember to look, I'm going to tar the whole thing up and archive it in case an "upgrade" from HP silently replaces that license file.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.