FreeSans: very excessive overshoot

[Martin Spacek]

Binary package hint: ttf-freefont

All the FreeSans latin characters with "curvy bottoms", like "a" and "t" overshoot the baseline far too much, assuming the baseline is where the latin characters with "straight bottoms" like "l" and "h" sit. Compared to Helvetica, or just about any other sans typeface I've seen, this really is excessive. In this respect unfortunately, Arial puts FreeSans to shame.

I've attached a screenshot of FreeSans 12 point in AbiWord, zoomed in to 500%. I added some straight lines underneath to help demonstrate just how big the overshoot is. Sometimes it doesn't look quite as bad as this, depending on the size and zoom (I guess hinting masks it a little at certain sizes). I've confirmed this in other applications, including OpenOffice and Firefox (while viewing http://www.gnu.org/software/freefont/), and on other systems. This is in maverick with ttf-freefont 20090104-7 installed. I've had a look at the latest release 20100919 from http://www.gnu.org/software/freefont/, no change. I have subpixel smoothing turned on, 96 dpi, slight hinting, and RGB subpixel order.

This was reported as a GNU FreeFont bug (https://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?22266) against FreeSansBold back in 2008. It's still open. I would argue it applies to all the font styles, but more so the non-bold than the bold. Another open GNU bug might be related (http://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?26187). There hasn't been any activity on either of these bugs in over 1.5 years. I would've added comments to them myself, but GNU's user registration password requirements are so anal that I gave up. Maybe some help/pressure from enough Ubuntu users can move these bugs forward.

[Steve White (stevan-white)]

I agreed on the FreeFont bug report.
At some point sizes, and on some font it looks OK, but at others I agree it looks very odd.

In particular, I use it at 12 point on my Ubuntu system for web browsing and such, and it looks great.
However, at 16 and 18 points, I find the overshoot distracting.

However, this deep overshoot is an original feature of the URW font on which the Sans face is based.
You can check this yourself.
The reason nothing has been done about it is, we have no idea what could be done about it.

What would you do? Completely revise the style of the face? Revise all 5289 glyphs in the face?
Do you have a weekend free?

A bug report on this topic (by "anonymous")
    https://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?22266
And has been commented on several times. We are still thinking about it.

As to the Savannah issues, this is not my domain, but I have heard a lot of complaints, and I know a lot of things have changed, including personnel. Perhaps you could try again.

By the way, not only was no pressure brought to bear, nobody told us that you had posted anything here.

[Steve White (stevan-white)]

I'm going to revise my opinion about the overshoot being very excessive.

I still think the overshoot is pronounced, but it is at a level of a stylistic choice.

There have been changes both to FreeFont and to the font rendering software in Ubuntu since I formed my original opinion.

The technical changes to the font that improved the on-screen appearance have to do with PostScript "blues" values, that indicate to the font rendering software what part of the glyphs are overshoot (among other things). When I made those changes, there was an improvement, but it wasn't all I had hoped. Now it appears the font rendering software has been improved too, as in Ubuntu Natty I no longer see the jumpiness that had annoyed me before.

Of course, overshoot is an intentional measure taken to visually align rounded letters with square one. Just how much overshoot is appropriate, is an aesthetic judgement. But to my eyes, a line of text in FreeSans appears quite straight--and I can tell you, with no overshoot at all, it would not.

Have a look at the attached picture.

If you have further remarks, it would be best to make them on the FreeFont page, as I said.

Cheers!