Description of Problem: /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/xdm/Xresources specifies bad average width for fonts which does not exists in the distribution xlogin*font: -adobe-helvetica-medium-r-normal--12-120-75-75-p-69-iso8859-1 xlogin*promptFont: -adobe-helvetica-bold-r-normal--12-120-75-75-p-69-iso8859-1 The average width 69 is wrong. Should be 67 and 70 for the medium and bold fonts, respectively. ------------------------------------------------- Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable): XFree86-xdm-4.2.0-8 XFree86-75dpi-fonts-4.2.0-8 -------------------------------------------------- How Reproducible: screen width should be <= 800 ------------------------------------------------- Steps to Reproduce: 1. xlsfonts -adobe-helvetica-medium-r-normal--12-120-75-75-p-69-iso8859-1 2. xlsfonts -adobe-helvetica-medium-r-normal--12-120-75-75-p-*-iso8859-1 3. ------------------- Actual Results: step 1 produces Xlsfonts: pattern "-adobe-helvetica-medium-r-normal--12-120-75-75-p-69-iso8859-1" unmatched. step 2 produces -adobe-helvetica-medium-r-normal--12-120-75-75-p-67-iso8859-1 ------------------------------ Expected Results: Both steps should match the fully specified font. -------------------------------------------------------------------- Additional Information: Suggest to replace 69 (averagre width) *, for all the fonts in this file, so they all look like ....-p-*-iso8859-1 BTW, On systems that have URW fonts (it is not in redhat linux 7.3 distribution) the problem does not arise, since the type 1 fonts n019003l.pfb and n019004l.pfb are used in this case to give the requested width.
About the URW fonts, RedHat7.3 do supply them in urw-fonts.2.0-17. However, the file /usr/share/fonts/default/Type1/fonts.dir has the foundry specified as URW rather then Adobe, e.g., n019003l.pfb -URW-Helvetica-medium-r-normal--0-0-0-0-p-0-iso8859-1 n019004l.pfb -URW-Helvetica-bold-r-normal--0-0-0-0-p-0-iso8859-1 which cannot be used by Xresources, unless again the font pattern is changed to -*-helvetica-.... Only fonts supplied in http://www.gimp.org/urw-fonts.tar.gz have a fonts.dir which specifies adobe as the foundry (in addition to a fonts.dir_fndry_is_urw file which specifies urw as the foundry) # xlsfonts -fn "-*-helvetica-bold-r-normal--12-120-75-75-p-*-iso8859-1" -adobe-helvetica-bold-r-normal--12-120-75-75-p-0-iso8859-1 -adobe-helvetica-bold-r-normal--12-120-75-75-p-70-iso8859-1 -urw-helvetica-bold-r-normal--12-120-75-75-p-0-iso8859-1
fonts.dir files are created at install time by mkfontdir. Any font packages which install premade fonts.dir files or which use hand edited fonts.dir files will break miserably when mkfontdir gets ran by automated processes. If our XFree86 font packages have fonts.dir problems, then XFree86 itself has these problems, and not just the Red Hat distribution. In this case, it is something that should be fixed by XFree86.org upstream so that every distribution can benefit from the fix, and also so that the people who know this stuff best can ensure that the fix is both correct, and also doesn't cause problems. Please email your bug report to xpert, xfree86, and your suggested fixes to fixes I will apply the change once it is integrated into XFree86 CVS and/or accepted as correct by the XFree86 team. I'll leave this report open and in NEEDINFO state for now. core team,
As I described it, the problem is in /etc/X11/xdm/Xresources, not in any of the fonts.dir. The fonts selected there do not exist in the redhat distribution. I didn't check any standard XFree86 distribution. There fore, I suggested the fix to /etc/X11/xdm/Xresources could be done bu redhat. If you disapprove, I'll look into the possiblility of notifying the mainteainers of XFree86. I beleive that since most of redhat users install gdm, they will notice the problem in xdm, but xdm configuration should be correct.
This change needs to be overviewed and accepted into XFree86.org sources, as I do not see it as necessary, and there hasn't been anyone else report this as a problem to us.