Is font rendering in gecko still better than recent openSUSE releases?

[datMaffin]

I am pretty sure that current openSUSE releases have greatly improved their text rendering: subpixel antialiasing of text is now enabled by default.
(I believe the responsible patent expired)

I am therefore wondering if geckolinux should/can still claim to provide improved font rendering.

Font rendering is mentioned in various places:

• https://github.com/geckolinux/geckolinux.github.io/blob/6893c0a428afb5a4d4ed5c0d5259b50e75c12a6a/index.html#L69
• https://github.com/geckolinux/geckolinux.github.io/blob/6893c0a428afb5a4d4ed5c0d5259b50e75c12a6a/index.html#L84
• README of geckolinux-project: https://github.com/geckolinux/geckolinux-project/blob/geckolinux-release/README.md

Unrelated:
Really like the idea of geckolinux; tried it in the days of openSUSE 42 (main reason was the font rendering). Great to see updated images!

[geckolinux]

That's a fair point, thanks for mentioning this. It would be good to do some side-by-side comparisons. I would add that there is more to font rendering than just the actual rendering minutia; the application theme and the specific font that is chosen also makes a huge difference in contrast and readability, and GeckoLinux is still very different from openSUSE in that respect.

[simonsaysthis]

Hello. Great discussion. To be honest, I still find gecko font rendering superior to Leap, especially when using Ubuntu fonts.

[geckolinux]

@simonsaysthis The Ubuntu fonts are seriously good. They can definitely go a long way to making any distro much more readable and enjoyable to look at all day.

[woodyx86]

Well,
I'm spending a lot of time reading codes, so I'm very keen to some fonts for programming due to their readability
I used to use Hack fonts, but I found one, I meant the better, or the most

https://www.ibm.com/plex/

Unfortunately there is no package in the Leap repo,
but if the geckolinux takes care of the all time coder or programmer as such,
I think it worth having a look.

[geckolinux]

@woodyx86 Oh that's a good one. Thanks for reminding me about Plex. I always love a good monospaced font. It's available in the Tumbleweed repos as texlive-plex-fonts, and there's a semi-official Leap repo here.

[datMaffin]

Fonts are highly subjective... So with a grain of salt 😉 !

Soo your talking about Monospaced fonts 😁 :

I feel like I need to defend Ubuntu Mono here: It is one of the best monospaced fonts (as soon as you get used to the m). Turns out I really enjoy the Ubuntu Mono m, which is why I forked another top (but unknown) font, Mononoki, and changed it to be more similar to Ubuntu Mono.
The only (really minor) issues I have with Ubuntu Mono are:

• The italic letters are too far back (some terminals (like xterm) cut them off)
• It exudes the "Ubuntu" brand (not that much, but at least a little)
• Italic i and l (I personally think they could be better like Consolas, Mononoki demonstrate).

About IBM Plex Mono: Yeah it definitely is not bad. Personally i do not really like the shape of i and l; i prefer the way of Ubuntu Mono/Hack. There are a few other letters of which I am not a big fan; like the t. I also like my Monospaced fonts to have the minimal amount of serifs (see IBM Plex r, f). I really like how different the italics of IBM Plex Mono look (kinda like Operator Mono), but I am more used to the Consolas style of italics.
However the reason why I (personally) would not choose IBM Plex Mono as the default is: It does not look as "sharp" as other fonts in low-DPI settings.

=> Ubuntu Mono is the best choice for the general case.

Other great Monospaced fonts (may not have heard of some of them):

• Source Code Pro - takes alot of width
• Iosevka - highly condensed width
• Iosevka Wide - Pretty good, but is more boring than Ubuntu Mono etc.
• Fantasque Mono - Great unless you want things to be aligned and perfect
• Inconsolata - Great but has no Italic
• Inconsolata LGC - Great but italics are not as polished as regular (and line height is really high in most programms)
• Cascadia Code - It recently got all the weights added but no italics (yet(?))
• Bitstream Vera Mono/DeJaVu Mono/Menlo - Boring and has no italics
• Hack - Improves a lot on DeJaVu but still pretty boring (I believe it is the default in openSuse)
• Mononoki - Might not be as polished/exhaustive as other fonts; development is really slow.
• Jetbrains Mono - Letters are really similar to each other (can be seen as good or bad)

And then there are monospaced fonts/variations with Coding-Ligatures (but I do not use them). If chosen as default they can be really confusing.

Now about sans serif fonts 😜:
I was thinking about IBM Plex Sans: I really like it; I use it as the default sans serif font in all my browsers. It also seems to be used everywhere; in youtube videos, reddit etc. I like it because it has more "character" than Open Sans (and the italic are more distinct (in a good way)).
To me Ubuntu Sans seems (even more so than the mono variant) to exude the "Ubuntu" brand (Geeko uses it for window titles). As far as I know openSuse uses OpenSans as default, which is a great neutral choice. IBM Plex Sans could be a great (more brand neutral) but more characterful alternative. However, I am not entirely convinced that it would objectively improve the readability when compared to Ubuntu Sans.

[geckolinux]

So, what do you think? Am I just biased? (Make sure to view all the images at 100%)

[datMaffin]

In the first image: Text without subpixel-antialiasing can be found in two places:
The application titles and the FF url bar:


Though everywhere else subpixel-antialiasing was used.

I was unable to find greyscale-antialiased text in the other 3 images.

I don't have a monitor to view the image correctly in 100%/pixel perfect. (Somebody else would need to critique "the whole" picture.)

[geckolinux]

Sharp eyes @datMaffin !

Here's another nice (unsolicited) testimony from a real-world user:
https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/i1t6lz/what_magic_has_geckolinux_made_to_font_rendering/

[geckolinux]

Here's another XFCE comparison, because I realized that the Numix theme changes the colors in unfocused windows.