Best font rendering suggestion

I think those would be big improvement, but are there any patent issues?

I think it haven't any patent issue because to infringe a "patented algorithm" you need to use a part of its source code.

An algorithm did not "infringe another patented algorithm" only if it obtain the same output from the same input.

This patch did not use any other "patented algorithms" code, so I think there isn't any patent issues!

What do you think about?

I agree.

I think it should be separate package and let users decide would they like to install it or not. My personal opinion is that this patch would make Ubuntu even more professional looking.

Too bad, I can't do much for this, but what others think?

I have just added a related new "specification" at the following URL:

https://features.launchpad.net/distros/ubuntu/+spec/better-font-rendering

Can you help to speedup its processing, please? :)

Here’s a recent posting by David Turner on how Microsoft Typography patents pretty much cover every interesting aspect of subpixel rendering of fonts.

http://article.gmane.org/gmane.comp.fonts.freetype.user/1912

This patch is really great...
I'm using for months, I do think that the "nonfree package way" it's the better choice to have this great feature without risking...

The patches in question are:

http://www.magiclinux.org/people/sunmoon1997/patches/cairo/git/0001-freetype-Add-fir-filter-for-subpixel-text-rendering-enabled-by-default.txt
http://www.magiclinux.org/people/sunmoon1997/patches/libXft/libXft-2.1.10-lcd-cleartype.diff

I don't think they're 'obvious' enough to 'just add' them.

Hi Daniel,
this is a FYI that the patches you referenced are outdated in that FreeType from version 2.3.0 on now includes an even further improved version of this. It is deactivated with the macro FT_CONFIG_OPTION_SUBPIXEL_RENDERING, which must be enabled at compile-time.

The detailed outline of this is here:
http://lists.nongnu.org/archive/html/freetype/2006-09/msg00069.html

If (and only if) this would be enabled Cairo and Xft would have to have their filtering code disabled. The patches for that are now here:

http://david.freetype.org/lcd

But please explain what you meant by "not obvious". If you think that the improment is not obvious, then well, many people do think it is.

Isn't there a patent issue which basically makes it impossible for Ubuntu to enable this feature? I recall SuSE disabling it for this reason.

I studied this issue further and it's clear that this feature cannot be suported by Ubuntu due to patent issues. Closing the bug.