Re: Rendering with xft and hinting

[Keith Packard <keithp keithp com>]

Around 23 o'clock on Mar 17, Daniel Egger wrote:

> I never managed to get subpixel AA running on my PowerBook. I tried to
> follow some explainations on the web but couldn't spot any difference.
> Also how do I figure out the layout of the subpixels? Googling didn't
> help finding an answer; I wish this feature was better documented... :/

The X resource setting 'Xft.rgba: rgb' works everywhere.  Otherwise, for 
current XFree86 CVS, you'll need to add:

<match target="font">
        <edit name="rgba" mode="assign"><const>rgb</const></edit>
</match>

to your /etc/fonts/fonts.conf file (or ~/.fonts.conf).

It's very likely that your subpixels are arranged 'RGBRGBRGB' on the 
screen; it's possible to have them arranged BGRBGRBGR, but I haven't seen 
that.   The best way to check is with a magnifying glass; I used the small 
spotting scope from my telescope turned around backwards.  It was a bit 
tricky to focus, but I could see the individual thin film transistors in 
the corners of each subpixel element.

Keith Packard        XFree86 Core Team        Compaq Cambridge Research Lab