Open source fonts!

[amdfangirl]

If you've ever looked at the fonts that are avalible inside a Linux or Free BSD office suite, you may find them quite lacking.

Google's new startup website has about 250 fonts (now) which are FOSS for you to enjoy. Links are provided below.

Historically, fonts have been a weak point in free software. There were probably two reasons: first, programmers were mostly indifferent to fonts, and, second, font designers were concerned about how their work might be used. However, in the last five years, the problem has been largely corrected, as a look at the Google Web Fonts page shows.

This change seems to have been brought about largely because of the SIL Font License. The license, which is recognized by the Free Software Foundation as being free, has become the most common one for releasing fonts because it addresses all the concerns of font designers, including the question of embedding fonts in documents, the right of derivative works to use the same name. These issues concern designers because they consider themselves artists, and are anxious to preserve the integrity of their work.

Google Web Fonts is not the only site where you can download free-license fonts, as a quick search will show. However, with over 140 posted fonts, and detailed histories and clear licensing information about each of them, the site is definitely one of the best for free-license fonts. There is even a tip jar for each font, although several designers have told me that the site is too recent for them to know what revenue -- if any -- the site might bring them.

As the name suggests, Google Web Fonts is intended mainly for embedding in web pages. A page gives detailed instructions on how to do so, and each download page stresses that having your own copy of the font is unnecessary. However, nothing in the font licenses or the site prevents you from downloading the fonts and installing them on your system for use in print documents.

Article: http://www.linuxpromagazine.com/Online/Blogs/Off-the-Beat-Bruce-Byfield-s-Blog/Google-Web-Fonts-prove-free-fonts-are-flourishing

Link: http://www.google.com/webfonts

 

[starzty]

Thanks! As a font nerd slowly moving away from OSX this is great!

 

[amdfangirl]

What distro do you use?

You should be able to find something to add more fonts to Linux.

For example, if you were using Fedora

http://fedoraunity.org/Members/khaytsus/improve-fonts

Just google for it and you should find it. Installing all the MS core fonts should be easy.

-AFG

 

[starzty]

I use Suse most of the time, there is actually an MS core font pack in the Non-OSS repository that is as easy to install as checking a box. I miss the wide variety of fonts available on mac or windows, more when formatting resume's than anything else. The yast installer is pretty much a wizard free zone, unlike google. This represents a serious failing.

 

[amdfangirl]

Oh I like terminal.

Unless it doesn't do what I want it to .

I design my own fonts with Fontforge... FOSS software that is, I hate outsourcing.

Never show them online. We artists are pick.

My regular font imitates my handwriting.

 

[starzty]

My handwriting wouldn't make a good font unless it was intended to give the impression of attempting to write and wrestling with an animal simultaneously. Handwriting good enough to commit to pixels is enviable!

Who doesn't like terminal? YAST actually has a text only version in case you don't have a VGA console. As long as I can use <ctrl><alt><Functionkey> to switch between x and terminal sessions I might as well use both. I used the internet before pictures, not for long, but I remember well enough that I don't need lynx to remind me.

Fontforge looks very neat. I may be playing with that next time I have a free day.

 

[amdfangirl]

My handwriting. I use it as a code.

 

[starzty]

Well played, well played