From: Russell Marks (russell.marks@dtn.ntl.com)
Date: Sun 13 Feb 2000 - 16:16:54 IST
> > Now that Matan has made FreeType available for SVGAlib, do you (meaning > > everyone) think that there should be a standard directory in Linux for TTF > > files? And if so, where? It would be kind of silly to distribute fonts > > with every application. > /usr/share/fonts/truetype seems appropriate to me. I can see it now... NEWSFLASH Experts on the widely-read linux-svgalib mailing list today suggested that TrueType fonts should be available in a single standard directory. A spokesman claimed that to think otherwise would be "kind of silly". Industry and community reactions were mixed. Microsoft's Steve Ballmer (who, having taken over the company, plans to change his name to `William H. Gates IV: The Voyage Home') observed that the move was "a typical Linux catch-up play. Microsoft's patented OneDirToRuleThemAll technology brought this innovation to Windows long before these Linux cowboys brought it up - and we've always said that everyone else was silly." Richard Stallman, insane genius and invincible GNU godhead, feared the suggestion was a disturbing portent. "A standard location for Microsoft-friendly fonts on a GNU/Linux system shows not how far we have come, but how far we have to go; we must talk of freedom, not fonts. What is required is not a single, concentrated source of evil - uh, I mean, Microsoft influence, but a concerted free software effort to disseminate GNU/typefaces far and wide. To this end, and to fight the curse of single-directory single-format fonts, I am founding the Forward-Facing Far-Flung Free Font Format Foundation (FFFFFFFF)." Stallman later apologised for his dissemination of saliva on those present. He suggested the new body could, to avoid further unfortunate incidents, be referred to as `minus one'. Eric S. Raymond, open source advocate, took time out from counting his millions to note that this was the first practical suggestion Stallman had made in at least ten years. "As I recall, however," Raymond warned, "the last one was something about how it would be nice to have a kernel. Be afraid, be very afraid." Meanwhile, representatives of prominent Linux distributions reacted positively; they said they "definitely couldn't give a toss". :-) Seriously, I think a better idea is to have a standard location (or, more likely, hierarchy) for fonts of *all* types. We'd certainly want to include Type 1 fonts, for example (commonly used by both X and ghostscript, at least). And it's all rather meaningless unless there's a) a standard set of free fonts you can be `sure' are going to be there (the URW Type 1 fonts spring to mind), and b) mention of it in a more appropriate forum. -Rus.
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