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by hi_dang_ 707 days ago
Nice article but sometimes I don’t know what’s worse - the state of linux audio drivers, or the state of linux text rendering.

It’s very easy to see when FreeType is used because it just looks off in a few, but significant ways. I’ve used it with and without Harf. DirectWrite has been a joy by comparison.

2 comments

I never had particular issues with Linux or Windows, but I have to say that I was surprised at how bad my MacBook looks when connected to an external 1080p monitor. I know Apple wants you to buy one of their fancy high resolution monitors or whatever, but it was so odd that one with a 1920x1080 resolution would look so bad. Even toggling the hi-dpi setting in BetterDisplay didn't help much.

Here's a quick picture from a few days ago: https://imgur.com/a/GLohlj1

I believe they don't even try to do hinting or sub-pixel rendering, where were key to Windows' crisp font rendering on low resolutions all the way back on Windows XP.
They don't indeed. Subpixel rendering was removed from macOS few years ago.
I’m resigned to the fact that I’ll be dead before Linux fonts look good. That’s true of many Linux features, actually. “Public” software is the quality of most public infrastructure, sadly, and smells vaguely of piss.