Re: GTK2 support in Emacs 21.3.1?

[Miles Bader]

"Stefan Monnier" <monnier+gnu.emacs.help/news/@flint.cs.yale.edu> writes:
> I'm pretty happy with my 6x13 fixed font, so I'm not going to spend
> my time on anti-aliasing although I agree it would be nice to have.

While current GTK2/FT2 font anti-aliasing looks great for typical
variable-width fonts, places where it gets used for fixed-width fonts
(e.g., gnome-terminal) look notably worse to me than versions using
non-anti-aliased fonts.

I'm not entirely sure why this is; some possibilities that come to mind:

  (1) FT2 doesn't render these fonts* well for some reason

  (2) They aren't hinted well (though at least Andale Mono seems hinted
      quite well actually)

  (3) Something about the usage of fixed-width fonts makes the artifacts
      of anti-aliasing (e.g. occasional fuzzy edges and uneven brightness)
      more objectionable than with variable-width fonts

  (4) I think I tend to use fixed-width fonts at smaller point sizes,
      as the number of columns visible often matters more with them,
      and anti-aliasing tends to look pretty bad at such point sizes

  (5) ?

* `These fonts' being the fixed-width fonts usable with FT2 on my
  system, e.g., Luxi Mono, Kochi Gothic, various versions of Courier,
  Andale Mono.

-Miles
-- 
A zen-buddhist walked into a pizza shop and
said, "Make me one with everything."