Re: Increase text size of echo area / mode line?

[Johnny]

Peter Dyballa <Peter_Dyballa@Web.DE> writes:

> Am 21.05.2011 um 14:01 schrieb Johnny:
>
>> Any suggestions welcome!
>
>
> Did you launch GNU Emacs with the -Q option? This means: without any
> customisation. Now enter: C-h H! After some a buffer HELLO will
> open. How is the size of the Chinese characters in this buffer? How is
> the size of the characters when you perform your usual completion test
> in mini-buffer?

Yes, this all looks nice and tidy.

>       (defvar my-fontset-spec)
>       (setq my-fontset-spec
>             "-*-fixed-medium-r-normal-*-15-*-*-*-*-*-fontset-normal,
>               chinese-big5-1:*-kai-*-*-15-*,
>               chinese-big5-2:*-kai-*-*-15-*"
>       )
>       
>       (create-fontset-from-fontset-spec my-fontset-spec)
>
Ok, so I am struggling here. The info says: 

|- C-h f create-fontset-from-fontset-spec
|When a frame uses the fontset as the `font' parameter, the frame's
|default font name is derived from FONTSET-NAME by substituting
|"iso8859-1" for the tail part "fontset-XXX"
|-------

I don't catch the drift at all. What is fontset-XXX? I guess we are
specifying a fontset based on (or containing?) normal, big5-1 and big5-2
and then applying it?

> It seems that font names from the fontconfig service also work:
>
>       (set-fontset-font "fontset-default" 'gb18030
> ("STFangsong". "unicode- 
> bmp")
>
> or, with a particular size:
>
>       (set-fontset-font "fontset-default" 'gb18030
> ("STFangsong-16". "unicode-bmp")

This is alternate methods, I assume? But where does STFangsong come from
and what happened to big5?

> Fontsets are documented in GNU Emacs' info system (C-h i).

Yes, I am reading that on and off, as well as Emacs wiki,
http://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/FontSets, but I still don't get it. Fonts
and faces seem to be one of the Emacs peculiarities, however I am sure
it is a great system once getting the hang of it! But for now...

My understanding so far is that I have only three fontsets installed
(default, standard and startup). Typing Chinese seems to use one of the
Charsets in the fontset (WenQuanYi) with a default size of 13, which can
be increased by C-x +. I guess, what I would like to do is to by default
use a larger size for the Chinese fonts, in particular the ones emacs
itselfs puts in the minibuffer when offering completions. Maybe one has
to set the same default size for all fonts in a buffer? If this is the
case, I guess what I am trying to do is changing the default font size
for the minibuffer?

Thanks for your effort in explaining, I'll keep fiddling with this and
see if I can make any progress!

Regards,

-- 
Johnny