Hebrew Type1 font problem
Hello everyone, I was wondering if there might be some font experts around. For Hebrew (working in Suse Linux 9.1), I downloaded a couple of free to use fonts via http://culmus.sourceforge.net/ That's all legal and permitted etc, and it worked for a few weeks, but suddenly the fonts didn't come out anymore in OpenOffice. I'm not sure if this is a pure "m17n" question but please don't throw me out yet ;-) I installed the fonts (which are PostScript Type1 fonts) in the /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Type1 directory. First I just put the file, which was a tar.gz file, there as /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Type1/culmus-0.101.tar.gz This worked for a while. So I guess when importing the fonts, those files were automatically "unzipped"? Later I installed a few Arabic Truetype fonts in the same way (except in /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/truetype of ocurse, but that didn't work. Apparently these were not unzipped ("de-compressed") automatically? So I took the compressed files out, by saving them somewhere else, and installed them all manually. Now that (still) works. The Arabic fonts all look perfect (but they're truetype). I configured all the fonts as active, but I can't find anywhere in any OpenOffice FAQ or such, what I did wrong. Can free fonts just "expire"? Even if they're designed for free use? Then I also have some directory called /usr/share/fonts/he/Type1 Here, "/he/" must stand for Hebrew. There, those fonts are also stored, I guess uncompressed. I didn't make that directory, I don't know who did ;-) Does that have anything to do with it? (Hebrew is the main Complex-Text-Layout (CTL) enabled language for OOo on my system.) I didn't want to bother you, but I thought the problem is interesting, anyway I'm getting to understand less of how fonts work everyday. Thanks and regards, Herman
"hermanmeester"
I installed the fonts (which are PostScript Type1 fonts) in the
/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Type1
directory. First I just put the file, which was a tar.gz file, there as
/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Type1/culmus-0.101.tar.gz
This worked for a while. So I guess when importing the fonts, those files were automatically "unzipped"?
No, there is no automatic unpacking. This just cannot work. You should unpack the archive and copy the fonts to /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Type1/. By the way, you can also copy fonts into the ~/.fonts directory in the home directory of a user. This makes the fonts only available for that specific user, but it is often convenient for testing.
Later I installed a few Arabic Truetype fonts in the same way (except in /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/truetype of ocurse, but that didn't work. Apparently these were not unzipped ("de-compressed") automatically?
No, please uncompress the package and copy the fonts to /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/truetype, not the archive.
Can free fonts just "expire"?
No.
Then I also have some directory called
/usr/share/fonts/he/Type1
Here, "/he/" must stand for Hebrew. There, those fonts are also stored, I guess uncompressed.
That's why the Hebrew fonts worked for you although you copied only archive to /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Type1/. /usr/share/fonts is also searched by default by fontconfig. And, fontconfig searches recursively, i.e. all subdirectories of /usr/share/fonts are searched as well. The culmus-0.101.tar.gz in /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Type1/ of course could not work but as you say you had another copy of the uncompressed fonts somewhere below /usr/share/fonts, this explains why you could use these fonts.
I didn't make that directory, I don't know who did ;-)
SuSE doesn't create that directory either, that means you must have
created yourself somehow, maybe by unpacking a tar-ball or installing
a non-SuSE rpm package.
--
Mike FABIAN
"hermanmeester"
For Hebrew (working in Suse Linux 9.1), I downloaded a couple of free to use fonts via http://culmus.sourceforge.net/
Is there interest to have these fonts as a package in the next SuSE
Linux version?
The "freefont" package contains Hebrew, but so far that seems to be
the only package containing outline fonts for Hebrew in SuSE Linux.
At first glance, the culmus fonts appear to be quite beautiful.
--
Mike FABIAN
ftp://ftp.suse.com/pub/projects/m17n/10.0/RPMS/noarch/culmus-0.101-0.noarch.rpm
ftp://ftp.suse.com/pub/projects/m17n/10.0/RPMS/src/culmus-0.101-0.src.rpm
Will be included in SuSE Linux 10.1.
Hermann, don't worry if you are still using an older version of SuSE
Linux, you can install the above packages nevertheless.
--
Mike FABIAN
participants (2)
-
hermanmeester
-
Mike FABIAN