Scaling issues on high DPI displays

[samkcarlile]

Edit: tresf, added checklist and workaround:

• Windows: - Partially working via d2e50df.
• Linux: - Implemented via 8a39302 reverted. reimplemented bbedfa9. (Qt5.6+)
• MacOS: - Implemented via 8a39302

Unfortunately some HiDPI displays don't scale properly. There's more discussion around this here: #4800 (comment)

# HiDPI workaround for problematic screens
export QT_SCALE_FACTOR=1
export QT_AUTO_SCREEN_SCALE_FACTOR=0
export QT_SCREEN_SCALE_FACTORS=2

Or permanently (use with caution!)

# HiDPI workaround for problematic screens
echo -e "QT_SCALE_FACTOR=1\nQT_AUTO_SCREEN_SCALE_FACTOR=0\nQT_SCREEN_SCALE_FACTORS=2" | sudo tee -a /etc/environment

---

This is my first time submitting an issue here, so If I'm doing it incorrectly, please let me know.

I'm on Windows 10 and would like to use LMMS, however, being on a Surface Book with a high DPI display, I can't comfortably use this software without squinting to see the various menu items and text. This application doesn't seem to scale when I scale Windows up. Is this a known issue or is it just me?

[tresf]

Known issue, unfortunately. Closing, marking as duplicate of #455, #2209, #1913, #82.

Edit: Reopened. :)

Quote from @BaraMGB

In the arch Linux wiki is an article which explains how to setup several desktop environments on hidpi resolution screens. This can help in the future for testing.
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/HiDPI

Quote from @michaelgregorius:

@Wallacoloo Yes, there are still several places where the fixed font sizes are used. For example in the song editor's tracks, also in lots of plugins and other places where custom widgets are used. I'd say there is still tons of work to do.

Here is a list of places where pointSize and pointSizeF are still called:

$ grep -l -r pointSize | sort | uniq
include/gui_templates.h
plugins/audio_file_processor/audio_file_processor.cpp
plugins/carlabase/carla.cpp
plugins/DualFilter/DualFilterControlDialog.cpp
plugins/ladspa_browser/ladspa_browser.cpp
plugins/monstro/Monstro.cpp
plugins/patman/patman.cpp
plugins/stk/mallets/mallets.cpp
plugins/vestige/vestige.cpp
plugins/VstEffect/VstEffectControlDialog.cpp
plugins/zynaddsubfx/ZynAddSubFx.cpp
src/core/audio/AudioAlsa.cpp
src/core/audio/AudioJack.cpp
src/core/audio/AudioOss.cpp
src/core/audio/AudioPortAudio.cpp
src/core/audio/AudioPulseAudio.cpp
src/core/audio/AudioSdl.cpp
src/core/midi/MidiAlsaRaw.cpp
src/core/midi/MidiAlsaSeq.cpp
src/core/midi/MidiOss.cpp
src/core/Track.cpp
src/gui/AutomationPatternView.cpp
src/gui/editors/AutomationEditor.cpp
src/gui/editors/PianoRoll.cpp
src/gui/PianoView.cpp
src/gui/SetupDialog.cpp
src/gui/widgets/ComboBox.cpp
src/gui/widgets/EffectView.cpp
src/gui/widgets/EnvelopeAndLfoView.cpp
src/gui/widgets/FxLine.cpp
src/gui/widgets/GroupBox.cpp
src/gui/widgets/InstrumentFunctionViews.cpp
src/gui/widgets/InstrumentMidiIOView.cpp
src/gui/widgets/InstrumentSoundShapingView.cpp
src/gui/widgets/Knob.cpp
src/gui/widgets/LcdWidget.cpp
src/gui/widgets/LedCheckbox.cpp
src/gui/widgets/MeterDialog.cpp
src/gui/widgets/MidiPortMenu.cpp
src/gui/widgets/ProjectNotes.cpp
src/gui/widgets/SideBarWidget.cpp
src/gui/widgets/TabBar.cpp
src/gui/widgets/TabWidget.cpp
src/gui/widgets/TextFloat.cpp
src/gui/widgets/VisualizationWidget.cpp
src/tracks/BBTrack.cpp
src/tracks/InstrumentTrack.cpp
src/tracks/Pattern.cpp
src/tracks/SampleTrack.cpp

Do you want to open a new issue for some of the remaining changes or reuse this one?

[musikBear]

@tresf Looks like all topics around this issue specific resolution on high-end screens/displays has been closed, or consolidated with font issues.
Imo at least one with high-resolution monitors should be kept open.
Some users even now has 4K monitors:
http://lmms.io/forum/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=4843&p=15906#p15906
But are -every- 'normal' application not suffering from exact that same issue?
How does anything, even Word, manage a 4K monitor?
Surely this cant just be a LMMS issue. 😖
I can only think of advising users with 4K monitors, to select a different general resolution. Can anyone suggest something better?
Imo. Schedule 1.2.x

[tresf]

Imo. Schedule 1.2.x

Stop.

I can only think of advising users with 4K monitors, to select a different general resolution.

No.

Can anyone suggest something better?

Buy an Ultra-HD display and try some things for yourself. :) No, there's no easy workaround here.

How does anything, even Word, manage a 4K monitor?

Perfect(ly).

But are -every- 'normal' application not suffering from exact that same issue?

No, they don't. Install QT Linguist on Windows. It does not suffer this scaling problem.

Some users even now has 4K monitors:

The exact resolution is immaterial, the fact that it doesn't scale is the problem.

@tresf Looks like all topics around this issue specific resolution on high-end screens/displays has been closed, or consolidated with font issues.

Yes, we've been making progress on some fronts by removing hard-coded values, but they still may be wrong as we aren't testing each CSS patch with the super-HD folks in mind.

But why are you resurrecting this topic specifically? And why tagging me? If you read them all, you'll find that QT5 is supposed to help this. We need more QT5 testers to confirm. We also need to decide if moving Windows and/or Mac to QT5 is sensible/feasible, but that carries its own tasks... You see... QT4 is available via Homebrew, Macports and via Toby's Ubuntu PPA which we then package into our desktop installers. The switch to QT5 will require these steps are taken to properly fetch and then package the libs for Mac and Windows OS. The library names changed a bit and I'm not sure we're ready for this in the middle of a stable release. It's not something we'll do before 1.2 and it's certainly not something we'll track in a scaling issues thread. 🍻

I suppose if we don't have ANY open bug reports on High DPI/Large Font support we can reopen this one.

[tresf]

@musikBear here's what LMMS looks like on Windows 10 running scaled desktop...

• ✅ File/Menu bar does scale
• ✅ MDI window titles do scale
• ⛔ Images do not scale
• ⛔ Fonts do not scale

[tresf]

More resources...

http://blog.qt.io/blog/2013/04/25/retina-display-support-for-mac-os-ios-and-x11/
http://doc.qt.io/qt-5/highdpi.html

[tresf]

Edit, Qt5 alone does not fix this problem...

LMMS built with Qt5 running on Windows 10 hi-res display:

[musikBear]

Very good explanation. Thanks! 🎁