5 of the Best Free Linux Font Tools
In the days when Linux was a fledgling operating system, font
handling was often identified as a major weakness. It was true that
Linux then had problems with dealing with TrueType fonts, its font
subsystem was prehistoric compared to its competitors, there was a
dearth of decent fonts, difficulties in adding and configuring fonts
made it almost impossible for beginners to improve matters for
themselves, and jagged fonts with no anti-aliasing just added to a
rather amateurish looking desktop.
Fortunately, the situation is considerably better these days,
with a better quality of user interface typography. With the continuing
improving FreeType font engine producing high quality output, natively
supporting scalable font formats like TrueType, Linux is making great
strides. The recent expiry of the patent behind
Apple's TrueType Bytecode Interpreter has meant that FreeType can now
render beautiful fonts. Furthermore, the development of the Ubuntu font
family, an open-type TrueType font, offers a further enhancement in
screen readability.
Another factor that has contributed to Linux becoming more
font friendly is improvements made in font management and editing
software. Font management software lets users browse and preview fonts,
to organise them by groups, to activate and deactivate
fonts, make comparisons between fonts, find fonts suitable for
a specific purpose, as well as generating font samples and font books.
Many distributions have hundreds of fonts pre-installed. This type
of software makes it simple to manage and evaluate these
fonts. In this article, we have highlighted the best font management
software available for Linux, as well as identifying our favorite font
editor.
To provide an insight into the software that is available, we
have compiled a list of 5 of our favorite font software. Hopefully,
there
will be something of interest here for users who want to mange the
fonts on their computer. We give our highest recommendation to
Fontmatrix and
FontForge.
So, let's explore the 5 font software utilities at hand. For
each application we have compiled its own portal page, a full
description with an in-depth analysis of its features, screenshots,
together with links to relevant resources and reviews.
Return to our complete collection of Group
Tests, identifying the finest Linux software.
Last Updated Saturday, May 12 2012 @ 10:59 AM EDT
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