[Ubuntu 18.04 LTS] Font not rendering properly

[bypassspace]

Hello,

After installing brackets on Ubuntu 18.04 LTS... i noticed fonts are not rendering properly. I checked for all the font related solution still no luck.

Here is the screenshot what my screen is look like: https://ibb.co/b7393n

And here is the Brackets version : https://ibb.co/ndUow7

Font Settings:

Font : Ubuntu Font Size : 14

Thanks

[vassilis]

Having the exact same issue with atom after upgrading Ubuntu from 17.10 to 18.04. So I guess the issue comes from Ubuntu, not the editors...

[yahuarkuntur]

I also upgraded to Ubuntu 18.04 and have the same font display issue.

[navch]

We are looking into this issue. More details will be updated shortly.

[pawelzydziak]

Me too, it's strange, because it seems to render properly in editors like VS Code, Pycharm or NetBeans, but in Google Chrome fonts looks terrible.

[g-217]

For font issue, libpango can be a reason. This package exists with two names in Ubuntu18.04(It was renamed recently, that's why transitional package)

libpango-1.0-0/bionic,now 1.40.14-1 amd64 [installed]
  Layout and rendering of internationalized text

libpango1.0-0/bionic,now 1.40.14-1 amd64 [installed,auto-removable]
  Layout and rendering of internationalized text (transitional package)

Please check if you have both installed.

[michau-krakow]

Same here. All I did to fix font rendering is I updated atom to 1.26.1. Worked like a charm.

[vkarick]

Also have same issue in Chrome. Looks ugly. How to fix it?

[vkarick]

Looks like this

[ikebeight]

Me too. And I've comfirmed packages that @gautam0217 says are installed.

ikebeight@bionic:~$ dpkg -l | grep libpango
ii  libpango-1.0-0:amd64                       1.40.14-1                           amd64        Layout and rendering of internationalized text
ii  libpango1.0-0:amd64                        1.40.14-1                           amd64        Layout and rendering of internationalized text (transitional package)
ii  libpangocairo-1.0-0:amd64                  1.40.14-1                           amd64        Layout and rendering of internationalized text
ii  libpangoft2-1.0-0:amd64                    1.40.14-1                           amd64        Layout and rendering of internationalized text
ii  libpangox-1.0-0:amd64                      0.0.2-5                             amd64        pango library X backend
ii  libpangoxft-1.0-0:amd64                    1.40.14-1                           amd64        Layout and rendering of internationalized text

Shoud I remove it?

[michau-krakow]

I would not. This thread https://github.com/atom/atom/issues/15737 provides elaborate discussion about identical issue with font rendering, its root cause, dependencies, workarounds... They narrowed it down to libfreetype library and finally fixed.

[newhoa]

This is a problem in FreeType 2.8.1 (libfreetype6). The solution is either downgrading to the Ubuntu 17.10 version (2.8.0), or upgrading to the latest 2.9.1 where the issue has been fixed. Unfortunately I couldn't find a .deb for Ubuntu or Debian yet, but I was able to find this OpenSUSE binary.

I downloaded that, extracted the libfreetype.so.6.16.0 binary. Then I went to /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/ and renamed libfreetype.so.6.15.0 file to old-libfreetype.so.6.15.0. Then I copied the new libfreetype.so.6.16.0 file to the folder and renamed it to libfreetype.so.6.15.0.

A roundabout way of doing it I guess, but it works. No more artifacts!

[michau-krakow]

Easier method is to start searching from launchpad.net or packages.ubuntu.com (I prefer the latter, as it provides clear info about package dependencies, to check what else am I missing).

[newhoa]

Yeah, hopefully it will hit the repositories soon and everyone will get the fix more easily. It may hit Debian first (keep an eye here).

Either way, this is a problem with FreeType and not with Brackets, so I think this issue could probably be closed.

[g-217]

Source of font rendering issue is libfreetype6-2.8.1 which is default version for Ubuntu-18.04. Upgrading or downgrading libfreetype6 will fix this issue.

You can download libfreetype6_2.8-0.2_amd64.deb from here for downgrading case: http://snapshot.debian.org/package/freetype/2.8-0.2/#libfreetype6_2.8-0.2

Updating to version 2.9.1 will also fixed the issue, but I could not find a package for this version. I have built it from source(https://download.savannah.gnu.org/releases/freetype/freetype-2.9.1.tar.gz) on Ubuntu-18.04(amd64) and put the binaries here. https://github.com/gautam0217/dot_profile/tree/master/freetype291

[michau-krakow]

Yes, downgrading libfreetype6 is a workaround BUT on the other hand, Atom renders fonts fine even on existing version 2.8.1-2ubuntu2 (18.04 default). In my opinion this suggests the library itself is fine but it may just be used wrong way by Bracket (as Atom/Electron/Chrome did in older versions).

[ghost]

I can confirm it's a libfreetype6 2.8.1-2ubuntu2 issue. I mean, I see problematic font rendering in many other applications. Not only are the fonts themselves "broken" and "off", but the font sizes vary continuously. First I thought my display size settings were varying autonomously, but in the end it turned out to be the font size. As for Canonical solving this: well, I think personally the down/ upgrade suggested here is the better, and certainly the quicker solution. After all, the reports on the fishy libfreetype6 version on git and Launchpad (e.g. https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/freetype/+bug/1722508) were already there in mid 2017, when in a previous *buntu release. So it'd be surprising if it now would be resolved instantly... DNS leak anybody?

[xfg]

@gautam0217 I install libfreetype6_2.8-0.2_amd64.deb through dpkg -i but after restart my ubuntu 18.04 upgrades the package to libfreetype6-2.8.1 back. How to solve this problem ?

[michau-krakow]

If it installs automatically, why don't you just disable automated upgrades? Another option is to use apt-pinning but it's too much to explain - just google it.

[GocaninTs]

sudo add-apt-repository "deb http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ artful-updates main" sudo apt-get update sudo apt-get install libfreetype6=2.8-0.2ubuntu2.1 sudo apt-mark hold libfreetype6

These commands solved my problem.

[sobisht]

Thanks for pointing out your issues. We will update this thread with fix related to this issue.

[morettolss]

GocaninTs solution works well :D https://github.com/adobe/brackets/issues/14290#issuecomment-394118945

[ankur22]

I just installed the latest version (1.28.2) of Atom from https://github.com/atom/atom/releases and it has resolved this issue for me.

[briskycat]

I could not find freetype 2.9.1 packaged for Debian/Ubuntu so I created a PPA for Ubuntu 18.04 Bionic Beaver myself: https://launchpad.net/~as-asaw/+archive/ubuntu/fonts Basically, I just replaced the sources in the Bionic's original 2.8.1 package and threw away a couple of patches meant to clean up the 2.8.1's code. The libfreetype6 deb package itself can also be installed on Ubuntu 16.04. Hope it will be useful to someone.

[briskycat]

@trytip That's very strange. What exactly do you mean by the "file" that you were trying to install? Did you add the PPA in the usual way (i.e. as in the description)? In fact, there are i386 versions of all packages in my PPA as you can see here: https://launchpad.net/~as-asaw/+archive/ubuntu/fonts/+build/15142100 (here is the libfreetype6:i386 deb) And even if there weren't I am still curious how this PPA could have broken anything keeping in mind that APT keeps track of all dependencies.

[trytip]

@briskycat completely my mistake. had issues with signature install and only downloaded x64 files. your PPA is working fine. thank you for that

[Grantimus9]

I just updated Ubuntu from 16.04 LTS to 18.04 LTS and experienced the same problem in Atom. Uninstalling and re-installing Atom solved it for me.

[AnwarShah]

Setting these in a file /etc/profile.d/fix-freetype.sh worked for me

export FREETYPE_PROPERTIES="truetype:interpreter-version=35 cff:no-stem-darkening=1 autofitter:warping=1"

[asfernandes]

@AnwarShah that maked gedit and synaptic very nice for me, but at the same time made Chrome very awful.

[burntcustard]

GocaninTs solution worked for me as well :+1:

I removed the artful repo afterwards as I don't (think I) need it for anything else after the downgrade:

sudo add-apt-repository --remove "deb http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ artful-updates main"

[AnwarShah]

@asfernandes Yeah, that's true. Chrome and firefox looks awful on Ubuntu 18.04. Don't know what's the main reason.

[akosmaroy]

is there a definitive solution for this?

[sanchitbansal10]

@GocaninTs solution worked for me as well

[DGPickett]

I installed 18.04 when prompted by Software Updater, and it had so many bugs, what a disgrace for an LTS release. Since May and not change to the package list to fix this in August, another disgrace.

• I do not look forward to pegging my OS to an old package.
• I am not keen on installing code under fake file names.
• The editor atom install fixed nothing in LibreOffice.

I found freetype-2.9.1-2.fc29.x86_64.rpm and converted it using alien, many "warning:.*NOKEY", but it seems like it refuses to install. Synaptic says I am still on the old one.

$ sudo alien Downloads/freetype-2.9.1-2.fc29.x86_64.rpm [sudo] password for dgp: warning: Downloads/freetype-2.9.1-2.fc29.x86_64.rpm: Header V3 RSA/SHA256 Signature, key ID 429476b4: NOKEY warning: Downloads/freetype-2.9.1-2.fc29.x86_64.rpm: Header V3 RSA/SHA256 Signature, key ID 429476b4: NOKEY warning: Downloads/freetype-2.9.1-2.fc29.x86_64.rpm: Header V3 RSA/SHA256 Signature, key ID 429476b4: NOKEY warning: Downloads/freetype-2.9.1-2.fc29.x86_64.rpm: Header V3 RSA/SHA256 Signature, key ID 429476b4: NOKEY warning: Downloads/freetype-2.9.1-2.fc29.x86_64.rpm: Header V3 RSA/SHA256 Signature, key ID 429476b4: NOKEY warning: Downloads/freetype-2.9.1-2.fc29.x86_64.rpm: Header V3 RSA/SHA256 Signature, key ID 429476b4: NOKEY warning: Downloads/freetype-2.9.1-2.fc29.x86_64.rpm: Header V3 RSA/SHA256 Signature, key ID 429476b4: NOKEY warning: Downloads/freetype-2.9.1-2.fc29.x86_64.rpm: Header V3 RSA/SHA256 Signature, key ID 429476b4: NOKEY warning: Downloads/freetype-2.9.1-2.fc29.x86_64.rpm: Header V3 RSA/SHA256 Signature, key ID 429476b4: NOKEY warning: Downloads/freetype-2.9.1-2.fc29.x86_64.rpm: Header V3 RSA/SHA256 Signature, key ID 429476b4: NOKEY warning: Downloads/freetype-2.9.1-2.fc29.x86_64.rpm: Header V3 RSA/SHA256 Signature, key ID 429476b4: NOKEY warning: Downloads/freetype-2.9.1-2.fc29.x86_64.rpm: Header V3 RSA/SHA256 Signature, key ID 429476b4: NOKEY warning: Downloads/freetype-2.9.1-2.fc29.x86_64.rpm: Header V3 RSA/SHA256 Signature, key ID 429476b4: NOKEY warning: Downloads/freetype-2.9.1-2.fc29.x86_64.rpm: Header V3 RSA/SHA256 Signature, key ID 429476b4: NOKEY warning: Downloads/freetype-2.9.1-2.fc29.x86_64.rpm: Header V3 RSA/SHA256 Signature, key ID 429476b4: NOKEY warning: Downloads/freetype-2.9.1-2.fc29.x86_64.rpm: Header V3 RSA/SHA256 Signature, key ID 429476b4: NOKEY warning: Downloads/freetype-2.9.1-2.fc29.x86_64.rpm: Header V3 RSA/SHA256 Signature, key ID 429476b4: NOKEY freetype_2.9.1-3_amd64.deb generated $ mv freetype_2.9.1-3_amd64.deb Downloads $ (cd Downloads;sudo dpkg -i freetype_2.9.1-3_amd64.deb) Selecting previously unselected package freetype. (Reading database ... 323396 files and directories currently installed.) Preparing to unpack freetype_2.9.1-3_amd64.deb ... Unpacking freetype (2.9.1-3) ... Setting up freetype (2.9.1-3) ... Processing triggers for libc-bin (2.27-3ubuntu1) ... $

Anyone have a clean way forward yet?

[DGPickett]

PS: When I reboot, it comes up with this notification in a window:

Failure to download extra data files

The following packages requested additional data downloads after package installation, but the data could not be downloaded or could not be processed.

ttf-mscorefonts-installer

The download will be attempted again later, or you can try the download again now. Running this command requires an active Internet connection.

Buy when I hit the reinstall button and add my password, it hangs with a wait circle. I checked on that package, and it seems to be properly installed, but the system thinks not.

[briskycat]

@DGPickett if you want a clean way of installing FreeType 2.9.1 on Ubuntu 18.04 see my comment above: https://github.com/adobe/brackets/issues/14290#issuecomment-406381592 Just add the PPA as an ordinary PPA following the instructions in the link and then do apt update && apt dist-upgrade.

[DGPickett]

OK, I followed your link and that seems OK, as I can see the freetype updated in Synaptic. Thanks!

[DGPickett]

Oops, right freetype, still no TT fonts in LibreOffice Writer. Are there more steps to undo this damage? Ugh, the original Ubuntu had no TT problems, and I loved the Verdana so much after an IEEE study found it most productive, I have tons of docs now I cannot render.

Plus, this is back, the busted package reinstaller: https://photos.app.goo.gl/Cbci4oDMHEK1osdX9

Which hangs like this (the red print at the bottom seems to be because it tries to go with no password, and does not disappear when I add the missing password, which is a bug): https://photos.app.goo.gl/Jd2aj8XQq41ubKYH6

[briskycat]

@DGPickett you may want to run sudo apt install --reinstall libfreetype6 to make sure your previous freetype package (the one converted from RPM) gets uninstalled. You may also want to run sudo apt install -f to fix any unconfigured packages/packages with unmet dependencies.

[DGPickett]

All that, reboots, still no TTF in LibreOffice 6.1! At least the "Failure to download extra data files" is absent this time.

[DGPickett]

Spoke too soon, "Failure to download extra data files" is back complaining about ttf-mscorefonts-installer. Maybe it is some side effect of using Synaptic to reinstall some ttf packages.

[DGPickett]

I used Synaptics to reinstall both update-notifier and ttf-mscorefonts-installer after a complete cleanup. No improvement. I guess I will have to teach libreOffice to substitute Veranda for Verdana.

Is there an easy way to return to LTS 16 so I get my ttf back? It was cleaner with the title bars, now I lose screen to one or two more. Is that gnome or kde or something?

[DGPickett]

This fixed me, probably the debian ttf: https://askubuntu.com/questions/852302/failure-to-download-extra-data-files-ttf-mscorefonts-installer

[DGPickett]

Well, except I still get the window saying ttf-mscorefonts-installer did not install completely. Some posts imply there are dead URLs for fonts in the mix. It is just a cosmetic pest, since I have my fonts everywhere for now!

[bacancy-keyur]

I have related/same issue. See the attached screenshot. Have this problem in Ubuntu 18.04 or I have broke something up? Please suggest.

[kanyck]

I have this problem on Gentoo as well. Every app I use renders fonts clearly and neat except brackets! (I use infinality-ultimate fontconfig package). Guys please, fix it somehow!

[DGPickett]

Which solutions above did you try? I am free of all but the daily update box!

[kanyck]

Which solutions above did you try?

Quite a few, actually -- they all about ubuntu and PPAs. At least I've freetype-2.9.1 The issue is that all these solutions are essentially workarounds, not solutions. The real problem is that every single app on my system works fine but brackets, that renders font on par with systemresquecd -- smal live distro aimed for recovering which includes nothing to improve font rendering at all. I see the same awful rendering quality on brackets. I've an imagination that brackets somehow just bypasses all the cool linux stuff aimed at good font rendering. That's what needs to be fixed, not font management which does essentially work. And I can see font related issues here opened over and over again since at least 2014 but no real progress for 4 years... That would be pity if I'll have to abandon overall nice brackets because of nightmare-stiled font rendering.

[phdsky]

GocaninTs's solution GocaninTs's solution works pretty well for my "Updated to Ubuntu18.04 chrome text rending stange" problem which troubled me a lot. After done these steps, just restart chrome can see it normal. Thanks!

[fiddybux]

sudo add-apt-repository "deb http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ artful-updates main" sudo apt-get update sudo apt-get install libfreetype6=2.8-0.2ubuntu2.1 sudo apt-mark hold libfreetype6

This help me .

Awesome dude. Worked really well.

[akosmaroy]

for the record: downgrading libfreetype6 doesn't solve the issue for me. so it's not a "silver bullet" solution