Re: [Devel] TrueType font-scaling

[Owen Taylor]

Vincent Caron <address@hidden> writes:

> On Sat, 2002-08-03 at 14:02, Ole André Vadla Ravnås wrote:
> > 
> > Ah, I see. Thanks! By the way -- another stupid question while I'm at it
> > :)) Why are the same TrueType-fonts a lot bigger in my Linux environment
> > than in Windows? Size 7 in Windows equals size 9 in my Linux environment
> > it seems.
> 
> Most of the time font sizes are specified in points (a point is 1/72
> inch or 0.035mm), not in pixels. It means that the resulting size in
> pixels depends on your screen resolution. The screen resolution is
> actually arbitralily set up by the OS. Windows let you choose the
> resolution in the 'Display Properties/Settings' panel, 'Advanced'
> button, where you select so-called 'big fonts', 'normal fonts' and so
> on. You'll notice somehting that says 'Normal size (96 dpi)', which is
> the default resolution of the screen under Windows. Try the 'other'
> option, it brings up an interactive dialog that shows the relation
> between font visual size and resolution.
> 
> It turns out that some Linux distro configure X with a 100dpi
> resolution. This makes font slightly larger than the Windows ones for
> the same point size. You can check your X resolution with 'xdpyinfo|grep
> resolution'.

The resolution there is not the same one used to convert points
to pixels. Limbo uses 96 dpi by default for that. Under GNOME,
you can change the resolution for font points=>pixels with:

 Preferences/Fonts,  Details button.

I'm not sure why the fonts for the original poster weren't the same
size for Windows and Limbo (was it with Limbo?). It sounds like some
app was selecting font sizes in pixels, not points.

Regards,
                                        Owen