Liberation Fonts Increase Interoperability For Linux Users

hweimer writes "Most problems when opening Word documents under GNU/Linux are due to missing fonts. Therefore, Red Hat published a set of fonts metric-compatible with the Windows core fonts last year. However, there were some concerns regarding the licensing that prevented many other distros to ship them. We finally managed to settle these problems, leading to better document interoperability for all GNU/Linux users."

Comments

Re:This is good, but

[larry bagina]

Computer Modern. It's been better than the default MS stuff for 25 years or so.

Re:Do I need/want these?

[pshuke]

Probably not. The appeal with these fonts, as I understand it, is that they can be distributed along with the rest of the operating system. Corefonts have some slight copyright issues. From the licence:

Reproduction and Distribution. You may reproduce and distribute an unlimited number of copies of the SOFTWARE PRODUCT; provided that each copy shall be a true and complete copy, including all copyright and trademark notices, and shall be accompanied by a copy of this EULA. Copies of the SOFTWARE PRODUCT may not be distributed for profit either on a standalone basis or included as part of your own product.

Note in particular the "Copies of the SOFTWARE PRODUCT may not be distributed for profit either on a standalone basis or included as part of your own product." part.

Re:Do I need/want these?

[Anonymous Coward]

corefonts are on dodgy legal ground since microsoft decided they weren't really interested in the improving the internet experience for all people, and their removal of them. If these new fonts are good enough, corefonts will be removed from the distros over time.

Re:Do I need/want these?

[Jherek Carnelian]

FWIW, the copy of those fonts that HP distributed with some versions of HPUX 11.11 did not have that same EULA.

The version of that paragraph included in the README file of /usr/lib/X11/fonts/ms.st/typefaces/README says:

Reproduction and Distribution. You may reproduce and distribute
an unlimited number of copies of the SOFTWARE PRODUCT; provided
that each copy shall be a true and complete copy, including all
copyright and trademark notices, and shall be accompanied by a
copy of this EULA. Copies of the SOFTWARE PRODUCT may be
distributed as a standalone product or included with your own
product. Copies of the SOFTWARE PRODUCT may not be sold or
distributed for any kind of fee. The difference being that the version of this EULA says you can include them "with your own product" which appears to mean you can charge a fee for your product and include the fonts "for free." It sure seems like that's what HP actually did given that they came with the copy of HPUX that they did charge a fee for.

And similar enough to be a good substitute

[Lonewolf666]

Like Arial is rather similar to Helvetica. Some people claim that Microsoft did this to avoid paying royalties, see also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arial#Criticism.2FSimilar_fonts.
Now this may be true or not, but after they almost copied Helvetica with Arial, turnabout's fair play.

Re:And similar enough to be a good substitute

[Anonymous Coward]

You know, I kind of get why people say that Arial is similar to Helvetica, but at the end of the day, what they wanted was a highly usable Grotesque sans-serif web and screen font. They managed to do it. There are still a great deal of differences is what I'm saying. Arial is a bit less outspoken and characteristic as Helvetica (which is why it's usually classified as a so-called "neo-grotesque" font). I work as a type designer in the Netherlands, BTW, but don't let that stop you from modding me down...:)

Re:This is good, but

[Anonymous Coward]

Gentium. It's released under the Open Font License, which I believe is "free" (by the FSF's definition).

It was also designed with many extended Latin characters, allowing ethnic groups across the world to produce documents typeset in Gentium. (I mean, just look at all these diacritics!)

Say what you want about the organization that produced these (SIL International), but this is a good-looking, high-quality typeface, which fits your criteria perfectly.

Re:This is good, but

[westlake]

What is really needed to help Linux stand out is a set of F/LOSS-licensed fonts that are of even better quality than the default MS stuff--I mean it's essential to be able to show Times New Roman correctly, but what would make Linux...stand out is a selection of superb fonts.

Times New Roman was introduced in 1932. Baskerville in 1757.

Type design at the highest level is an extraordinarily rare art and craft.

Assuming you have that problem solved, how do limit their distribution of your new font set to the "free" operating systems - without having the pragmatists and the ideologues of F/OSS coming at you with pitchforks from every side?

Linux has about a 0.68% share of the desktop. Sun with OpenOffice.org and the Mozilla Foundation with Firefox have set their sights a little higher.

Re:I fixed it for you

[deniable]

We had Word documents get so screwed up that Word wouldn't open them. The best fix was to open them in OpenOffice and re-save them. It messed up the formatting, but it was better than losing a days work. I keep it around as a repair tool even in an all MS shop.

If you think Word is evil, stay away from Publisher.

Re:This is good, but

[Anonymous Coward]

Apart from main designer there is need for a lot of folks who will adjust national characters.

For example, Polish 'a ogonek [Ä...], e ogonek [Ä(TM)], and A ogonek [Ä]' has "ogonek" in wrong place. Any designer who knows Polish rules of font making can show you whats wrong...

Of course font is legible, but it's not as pleasing as it could be...

Thats what keeps them free.

[Anonymous Coward]

Everyone in GNULand will just use their package manager and install them. Free. Then they can add on their word processor of choice and use them as they see fit. By not allowing them into for profit projects they prevent the misappropriation of the fonts and it is a non-issue when the Free distros can just throw it on their repositories.

Try terminus - Re:What's wrong with IBM Courier?

[jchandra]

Terminus fonts (xfonts-terminus on ubuntu) looks good on LCD.

I've switched to that after using lucidasanstypewriter for about 12 yrs.

Re:Do I need/want these?

[cbart387]

I find the liberation fonts more visually appealing. Fedora has a lush look to it without any tweaking, in my opinion ... and part of that is the font choice. If you're curious what it looks like, just do a search for Fedora screenshots.

Re:Do I need/want these?

[alexgieg]

If I already have corefonts installed, do I need or want these? I've tried the Liberation fonts some months ago, but went back to mscorefonts.

My reason was that, while Liberation seem to look as "good" as MS' ones with font blurring enabled (that subpixel-something I hate, also the reason I put "good" between quotes), once you disable the blurring they become a set of disconnected lines and dots that only slightly resemble the alphabet. MS fonts, on the other hand, look beautifully, sharp and crisp, on blurless mode. Now, I don't know whether Liberation has improved its blurless support since then, but I doubt it. It seems nowadays everything is designed for blur-only operation.

So, if you're also an anti-blur old timer like me, I'd say no, you don't need or want these, quite the opposite, you'll want as much distance from them as possible.

If, on the other hand, you do like blurred fonts, then they're a good replacement, I guess.