Default fonts configuration not working #16026

romildo · 2016-06-06T19:08:55Z

Issue description

In my unstable NixOS configuration I have

  fonts = {
    fonts = with pkgs; [
      dejavu_fonts
      source-code-pro
      source-sans-pro
      source-serif-pro
    ];
    fontconfig = {
      defaultFonts = {
        monospace = [ "Source Code Pro" ];
        sansSerif = [ "Source Sans Pro" ];
        serif     = [ "Source Serif Pro" ];
      };
      ultimate = {
        enable = false;
      };
    };
  };

And it seems that the fonts.fontconfig.defaultFonts options are not being taken into account:

$ fc-match monospace
DejaVuSansMono.ttf: "DejaVu Sans Mono" "Book"

$ fc-match sans-serif
DejaVuSans.ttf: "DejaVu Sans" "Book"

$ fc-match serif
DejaVuSerif.ttf: "DejaVu Serif" "Book"

Is there anything missing on the configuration or is it a bug?

Technical details

System: (NixOS: nixos-version, Ubuntu/Fedora: lsb_release -a, ...)

16.09pre84674.fbde3a7 (Flounder)
Nix version: (run nix-env --version)

nix-env (Nix) 1.11.2
Nixpkgs version: (run nix-instantiate --eval '<nixpkgs>' -A lib.nixpkgsVersion)

"16.09pre84674.fbde3a7"

The text was updated successfully, but these errors were encountered:

ericsagnes · 2016-06-07T03:02:58Z

What are the contents of /etc/fonts/conf.d/60-nixos-generic-alias.conf?

romildo · 2016-06-07T11:26:27Z

The options are reflected in /etc/fonts/conf.d/60-nixos-generic-alias.conf, but somehow fontconfig is not following it.

<?xml version='1.0'?>
<!DOCTYPE fontconfig SYSTEM 'fonts.dtd'>
<fontconfig>

  <!-- Default fonts -->
  <alias>
  <family>sans-serif</family>
  <prefer>
    <family>Source Sans Pro</family>
  </prefer>
</alias>

  <alias>
  <family>serif</family>
  <prefer>
    <family>Source Serif Pro</family>
  </prefer>
</alias>

  <alias>
  <family>monospace</family>
  <prefer>
    <family>Source Code Pro</family>
  </prefer>
</alias>


</fontconfig>

ericsagnes · 2016-06-07T11:40:52Z

So it is not a problem with the configuration files.
It could be a fontconfig cache issue, does manually clearing the cache (fc-cache -rv) improve the situation?

romildo · 2016-06-07T12:06:42Z

After running fc-cache -rv both as a normal user and as root, and rebooting the system, the default font settings are still not working.

fc-cache -rv tells something about an unwritable cache directory:

# fc-cache -rv
/nix/store/ycpxf0i8df41cd20wbv9amkk1ijjq24a-dejavu-fonts-2.35: caching, new cache contents: 0 fonts, 1 dirs
[...]
Re-scanning /nix/store/bsl0fhisfb180a9v1zrgn3la4ja2m7gv-source-serif-pro-1.017/share/fonts: caching, new cache contents: 0 fonts, 1 dirs
/root/.cache/fontconfig: cleaning cache directory
/var/cache/fontconfig: cleaning cache directory
/nix/store/a8kmvl58x4xsa2flwrz17c4nd3g0khxd-fc-cache: not cleaning unwritable cache directory
fc-cache: succeeded

Maybe this can be relevant.

vcunat · 2016-06-09T12:40:23Z

I don't think so. The unwritable caches are intentional.

romildo · 2016-06-09T13:34:43Z

I have also tried disabling fontconfig-ultimate settings (by means of fonts.fontconfig.ultimate.enable), but the issue persists.

abbradar · 2016-06-09T13:36:35Z

Hm, maybe we have the configuration wrong? Try making it work with $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/fontconfig/fonts.conf (it's a user-wise configuration file which should have higher priority than system ones).

ericsagnes · 2016-06-09T13:56:11Z

You can check which settings files are loaded by using FC_DEBUG=1024, for example:

$ FC_DEBUG=1024 fc-match serif | less

maybe that can give you a hint of what is going wrong, the last files loaded should the ones generated by nix:

        Loading config file /etc/fonts/2.11/conf.d/60-nixos-generic-alias.conf
        Loading config file /etc/fonts/2.11/conf.d/99-user.conf

romildo · 2016-06-09T13:57:34Z

$XDG_CONFIG_HOME is not set on my system. Should it be?

After setting $XDG_CONFIG_HOME:

$ export XDG_CONFIG_HOME=~/.config

And saving $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/fontconfig/fonts.conf with the contents:

<?xml version='1.0'?>
<!DOCTYPE fontconfig SYSTEM 'fonts.dtd'>
<fontconfig>

  <!-- Default fonts -->
  <alias>
    <family>sans-serif</family>
    <prefer>
      <family>Source Sans Pro</family>
    </prefer>
  </alias>

  <alias>
    <family>serif</family>
    <prefer>
      <family>Source Serif Pro</family>
    </prefer>
  </alias>

  <alias>
    <family>monospace</family>
    <prefer>
      <family>Ubuntu Mono</family>
    </prefer>
  </alias>

</fontconfig>

And rebuilding the font information caches (as a normal user) with the command:

$ fc-cache -rv

The default fonts are not changed:

$ fc-match monospace
DejaVuSansMono.ttf: "DejaVu Sans Mono" "Book"

$ fc-match sans-serif
DejaVuSans.ttf: "DejaVu Sans" "Book"

$ fc-match serif
DejaVuSerif.ttf: "DejaVu Serif" "Book"

romildo · 2016-06-09T14:01:46Z

$ FC_DEBUG=1024 fc-match monospace
FC_DEBUG=1024
    Loading config file /etc/fonts/2.11/fonts.conf
    Scanning config dir /nix/store/s7ik4lhwl0r8kx83x9gly2bb8h52z8r9-fontconfig-2.11.1/etc/fonts/conf.d
    Loading config file /nix/store/s7ik4lhwl0r8kx83x9gly2bb8h52z8r9-fontconfig-2.11.1/etc/fonts/conf.d/10-scale-bitmap-fonts.conf
    Loading config file /nix/store/s7ik4lhwl0r8kx83x9gly2bb8h52z8r9-fontconfig-2.11.1/etc/fonts/conf.d/20-unhint-small-vera.conf
    Loading config file /nix/store/s7ik4lhwl0r8kx83x9gly2bb8h52z8r9-fontconfig-2.11.1/etc/fonts/conf.d/30-metric-aliases.conf
    Loading config file /nix/store/s7ik4lhwl0r8kx83x9gly2bb8h52z8r9-fontconfig-2.11.1/etc/fonts/conf.d/30-urw-aliases.conf
    Loading config file /nix/store/s7ik4lhwl0r8kx83x9gly2bb8h52z8r9-fontconfig-2.11.1/etc/fonts/conf.d/40-nonlatin.conf
    Loading config file /nix/store/s7ik4lhwl0r8kx83x9gly2bb8h52z8r9-fontconfig-2.11.1/etc/fonts/conf.d/45-latin.conf
    Loading config file /nix/store/s7ik4lhwl0r8kx83x9gly2bb8h52z8r9-fontconfig-2.11.1/etc/fonts/conf.d/49-sansserif.conf
    Loading config file /nix/store/s7ik4lhwl0r8kx83x9gly2bb8h52z8r9-fontconfig-2.11.1/etc/fonts/conf.d/60-latin.conf
    Loading config file /nix/store/s7ik4lhwl0r8kx83x9gly2bb8h52z8r9-fontconfig-2.11.1/etc/fonts/conf.d/65-fonts-persian.conf
    Loading config file /nix/store/s7ik4lhwl0r8kx83x9gly2bb8h52z8r9-fontconfig-2.11.1/etc/fonts/conf.d/65-nonlatin.conf
    Loading config file /nix/store/s7ik4lhwl0r8kx83x9gly2bb8h52z8r9-fontconfig-2.11.1/etc/fonts/conf.d/69-unifont.conf
    Loading config file /nix/store/s7ik4lhwl0r8kx83x9gly2bb8h52z8r9-fontconfig-2.11.1/etc/fonts/conf.d/80-delicious.conf
    Loading config file /nix/store/s7ik4lhwl0r8kx83x9gly2bb8h52z8r9-fontconfig-2.11.1/etc/fonts/conf.d/90-synthetic.conf
    Scanning config dir /etc/fonts/2.11/conf.d
    Loading config file /etc/fonts/2.11/conf.d/00-nixos.conf
    Loading config file /etc/fonts/2.11/conf.d/10-nixos-rendering.conf
    Loading config file /etc/fonts/2.11/conf.d/60-nixos-generic-alias.conf
    Loading config file /etc/fonts/2.11/conf.d/99-user.conf
DejaVuSansMono.ttf: "DejaVu Sans Mono" "Book"

It looks normal to me.

vcunat · 2016-06-09T14:09:10Z

$XDG_CONFIG_HOME is not set on my system. Should it be?

No, it's defined in standards that $HOME/.config is the default value.

ericsagnes · 2016-06-09T15:52:00Z

@romildo Can you try to set the <alias> tag in your ~/.config/fontconfig/fonts.conf to <alias binding="strong"> and check if it improves the situation?

romildo · 2016-06-09T16:39:54Z

@ericsagnes With <alias binding="strong"> it works.

ericsagnes · 2016-06-10T12:22:54Z

With it works.

So this should be a priority issue.
This might be due to the setting files not being interleaved, so default and font-ultimate settings over 60 take precedence on 60-nixos-generic-alias.conf.

My guess is that the <prefer> declaration in 65-wqy-zenhei.conf is setting deja vu fonts as the most preferred font and the configuration.nix settings get a lower priority.

You can try to use -s flag to fc-match to see where the fonts set in configuration.nix appears in the sorted list of matched fonts.

Maybe we should use lndir or buildEnv as suggested in #9110 to have interleaved font settings directory.

romildo · 2016-06-10T17:16:03Z

I have edited some of my prior comments to use a more simple font configuration, in the hope it would make it easier to fix this issue. Basically I have disabled fontconfig ultimate and reduced the list of installed fonts

romildo · 2016-06-10T17:51:26Z

Looking at each one of the config files reported by the command FC_DEBUG=1024 fc-match monospace I can find just two files that mention both the monospace and the DejaVu Sans Mono families:

$ grep -i 'DejaVu Sans Mono' $(grep -lir monospace /nix/store/s7ik4lhwl0r8kx83x9gly2bb8h52z8r9-fontconfig-2.11.1/etc/fonts/conf.d/* /etc/fonts/2.11/conf.d/*)
/nix/store/s7ik4lhwl0r8kx83x9gly2bb8h52z8r9-fontconfig-2.11.1/etc/fonts/conf.d/45-latin.conf:       <family>DejaVu Sans Mono</family>
/nix/store/s7ik4lhwl0r8kx83x9gly2bb8h52z8r9-fontconfig-2.11.1/etc/fonts/conf.d/60-latin.conf:           <family>DejaVu Sans Mono</family>

45-latin.conf, that sets a default alias:

    <alias>
        <family>DejaVu Sans Mono</family>
        <default><family>monospace</family></default>
    </alias>

60-latin.conf, that sets a prefer alias:

    <alias>
        <family>monospace</family>
        <prefer>
            <family>Bitstream Vera Sans Mono</family>
            <family>DejaVu Sans Mono</family>
            <family>Inconsolata</family>
            <family>Andale Mono</family>
            <family>Courier New</family>
            <family>Cumberland AMT</family>
            <family>Luxi Mono</family>
            <family>Nimbus Mono L</family>
            <family>Courier</family>
        </prefer>
    </alias>

Maybe this information can help to find a fix.

romildo · 2016-06-10T18:27:24Z

Using -s flag to fc-match to see where the fonts set in configuration.nix appears in the sorted list of matched fonts:

$ fc-match -s monospace
DejaVuSansMono.ttf: "DejaVu Sans Mono" "Book"
DejaVuSansMono-Bold.ttf: "DejaVu Sans Mono" "Bold"
luximr.ttf: "Luxi Mono" "Regular"
FreeMono.ttf: "FreeMono" "нормален"
SourceCodePro-Regular.otf: "Source Code Pro" "Regular"
FreeSans.ttf: "FreeSans" "нормален"
FreeSerif.ttf: "FreeSerif" "нормален"
DejaVuSans.ttf: "DejaVu Sans" "Book"
DejaVuSerif.ttf: "DejaVu Serif" "Book"
SourceSansPro-Regular.otf: "Source Sans Pro" "Regular"
LiberationMono-Regular.ttf: "Liberation Mono" "Regular"
Ubuntu-C.ttf: "Ubuntu Condensed" "Regular"
Ubuntu-R.ttf: "Ubuntu" "Regular"
unifont.ttf: "Unifont" "Medium"
DejaVuSerif-Italic.ttf: "DejaVu Serif" "Italic"
LiberationSerif-Italic.ttf: "Liberation Serif" "Italic"
DejaVuSans-BoldOblique.ttf: "DejaVu Sans" "Bold Oblique"
6x13.pcf.gz: "Fixed" "SemiCondensed"
9x15.pcf.gz: "Fixed" "Regular"

alecmev · 2017-04-15T12:07:04Z

@ericsagnes This should be closed, right?

romildo · 2017-05-11T18:44:29Z

I am seeing this bug again on NixOS unstable 17.09pre107265.0afb6d789c (Hummingbird).

I have in configuration.nix:

  fonts = {
    fonts = with pkgs; [
      dejavu_fonts
      source-code-pro
      source-sans-pro
      source-serif-pro
    ];
    fontconfig = {
      penultimate.enable = false;
      defaultFonts = {
        monospace = [ "Source Code Pro" ];
        sansSerif = [ "Source Sans Pro" ];
        serif     = [ "Source Serif Pro" ];
      };
    };
  };

But sanserif and serif default fonts are not being obeyed:

$ for f in mono sans serif; do fc-match $f; done
SourceCodePro-Regular.otf: "Source Code Pro" "Regular"
DejaVuSans.ttf: "DejaVu Sans" "Book"
DejaVuSerif.ttf: "DejaVu Serif" "Book"

cc @ericsagnes @vcunat

ericsagnes · 2017-05-11T23:20:31Z

Should be fixed by #25720.

romildo changed the title ~~Default fonts not working~~ Default fonts configuration not working Jun 6, 2016

joachifm added 0.kind: bug Something is broken 6.topic: nixos Issues or PRs affecting NixOS modules, or package usability issues specific to NixOS labels Jun 7, 2016

ericsagnes mentioned this issue Jul 5, 2016

fontconfig: fix etc priority #16730

Closed

7 tasks

ericsagnes mentioned this issue May 11, 2017

fontconfig-penultimate: fix zenhei font priority #25720

Closed

7 tasks

ericsagnes mentioned this issue May 12, 2017

wqy-zenhei-sharp.conf: fix priority ttuegel/fontconfig-penultimate#1

Merged

ttuegel closed this as completed in ttuegel/fontconfig-penultimate#1 May 12, 2017

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Default fonts configuration not working #16026

Default fonts configuration not working #16026

romildo commented Jun 6, 2016 •

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ericsagnes commented May 11, 2017

Default fonts configuration not working #16026

Default fonts configuration not working #16026

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romildo commented Jun 6, 2016 • edited Loading

Issue description

Technical details

ericsagnes commented Jun 7, 2016

romildo commented Jun 7, 2016 • edited Loading

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