Ubuntu
xorg package

Font rendering glitches with radeon, known bug, patch exists

Bug #62537 reported by espinosa_cz
10
Affects Status Importance Assigned to Milestone
X.Org X server
Won't Fix
High
Baltix
Invalid
Undecided
Unassigned
xorg (Ubuntu)
Invalid
Undecided
Unassigned
xserver-xorg-video-ati (Ubuntu)
Won't Fix
Low
Unassigned

Bug Description

This is a reminder of old known Xorg radeon bug, see: https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1424
and a plea to apply a perfect remedy patch https://bugs.freedesktop.org/attachment.cgi?id=2402

Font rendering glitches with radeon cards – it affects mainly OpenOffice.org (menus and canvas), very rarely Firefox, both only when RenderAccel is on. Luckily, there is a patch. This patch was included Thac Xorg 7.0 packages for PCLinux and Mandriva long time ago. I used pathed Xorg version for nerly half a year and must confirm rendering problems gone.

Would you be so kind and inlude this path into Xorg?

This is quite old patch from 2005-04-12. One and half year and it was still not included into official Xorg. It's a shame! I have just swithed from PCLinux to Kubuntu and it was very annoing to see this bug back again. As I'm a frequent user of OpenOffice.org and I indeed want to use acclerated graphics and antialiased fonts.

I can provide screenshots of glitched fonts on request.

Bug appears on all versions of Xorg in Kubuntu Dapper and Kubuntu Edgy even with the lates xserver-xorg-core 1.1.1-0ubuntu11 and xserver-xorg-video-ati 6.6.2-0ubuntu2 and xserver-xorg 7.0.22ubuntu10.

Note: the original reporter indicated the bug was in package 'xorg'; however, that package was not published in Baltix.

Revision history for this message
espinosa_cz (espinosa-cz) wrote :

This is Ubuntu/Kubuntu bug report, not Baltrix

Revision history for this message
Caroline Ford (secretlondon) wrote :

Rejected as per reporter's request

Revision history for this message
Jacob Winski (winski) wrote :

Confirmed bug. Please see the horrible font problem in the preference/options window attachment provided. Some letters are not even shown, others have strange bendings (r looks line n with shadow).

Revision history for this message
Jacob Winski (winski) wrote :

gedit with the same text without font problem for comparison.

Revision history for this message
espinosa_cz (espinosa-cz) wrote :

After last updates of fontconfig, OOo and Xorg the issue is less obvious, retreats a little bit but it's still present. Fonts in UI are fine now (for me) but ithere are still some artifacts on some fonts on canvas, especially big letters, naturally big or when zoom is used, again often r letter, but not all r letters, sometimes forced repaint helps, sometimes not.

Revision history for this message
espinosa_cz (espinosa-cz) wrote :

Hoooray!
According to xorg bugzilla (see 1424 bugreport) this issue was fixed in upcoming xorg 7.2. PLEASE include version 7.2. ASAP.
Thank you.

Revision history for this message
Robert Knight (robertknight) wrote :

Hello,

I see this problem as well, but reported it against OpenOffice. Please confirm.

Revision history for this message
Robert Knight (robertknight) wrote :

I can confirm this problem against Ubuntu Feisty Herd 2 with a Radeon Mobility M6.

Unfortunately the patch mentioned is taken from two years ago, I think it may no longer be valid.

Revision history for this message
espinosa_cz (espinosa-cz) wrote :

It's a trivial patch. It would be easy to find affected lines (2-3?) in current sources and check them by bare eye. There is high probability that it will fit.

It's not Ubuntu specific, I have just tested SuSE with xorg 7.2rc2, and it is still there :( I'v got a bad feeling. And it's not limited to OOo, but also sometimes Firefox and even Konqueror! ..well it's extremely rare.

Timo Aaltonen (tjaalton)
Changed in xorg:
status: Unconfirmed → Rejected
Revision history for this message
Timo Aaltonen (tjaalton) wrote :

Looking at the upstream bug (which is now closed again) the situation is everything bug trivial. That patch is not going to be upstream as is. Also, I can't reproduce this with feisty on a Radeon 8500.

Changed in xserver-xorg-video-ati:
importance: Undecided → Low
Bug Watch Updater (bug-watch-updater)
Changed in xorg-server:
status: Unknown → Rejected
Bug Watch Updater (bug-watch-updater)
Changed in xorg-server:
status: Invalid → Won't Fix
Revision history for this message
Timo Aaltonen (tjaalton) wrote :

Closing the bug, since the patch is not going upstream.

Changed in xserver-xorg-video-ati:
status: New → Won't Fix
Bug Watch Updater (bug-watch-updater)
Changed in xorg-server:
importance: Unknown → High
Bug Watch Updater (bug-watch-updater)
Changed in xorg-server:
importance: High → Unknown
Bug Watch Updater (bug-watch-updater)
Changed in xorg-server:
importance: Unknown → High
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