Installing Truetype In RedHat Linux

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Symptoms

Windows Truetype fonts such as "Verdana" are not available by default on Linux systems. Unfortunately, many existing web pages specifically require these fonts and are displayed incorrectly without them.

Cause

Lack of Truetype fonts on Linux is caused by copyright issues. Unlike linux, the fonts are not free and cannot be distributed at will.

Resolution

If you have a Windows system, follow the following steps in order to make Truetype fonts available to Linux, :
  1. Create a directory for Truetype fonts, e.g. /usr/local/share/fonts/ttfonts.
  2. Copy there all files from Windows font directory which is usually c:\winnt\fonts on Windows NT/2000.
  3. Convert all font file names to lower case using this shell script.
  4. Create fonts.dir and fonts.scale file by giving this commands:

    ttmkfdir -o fonts.scale
    mkfontdir

  5. Create fonts.alias file by using this Perl script.
  6. Use command "/usr/sbin/chkfontpath -add dirname" to add directory to xfs path
That's it. Enjoy your Truetype fonts!

References: http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Font-HOWTO/

Copyright (c) Ivan Krivyakov. Last updated: November 17, 2002