Wow, this is pretty terrible - must be something different than what I
experienced.  My "shadows" were always there (i.e. it didn't get worse) and
it was only like 1 pixel width.  Also, I no longer have the problem after
following the advice someone gave of putting the following .fonts.conf in my
$HOME directory:
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<!DOCTYPE fontconfig SYSTEM "fonts.dtd">
<fontconfig>
  <match target="font">
    <edit mode="assign" name="lcdfilter">
      <const>lcddefault</const>
    </edit>
    <edit mode="assign" name="rgba" >
      <const>rgb</const>
    </edit>
    <edit mode="assign" name="hinting" >
      <bool>true</bool>
    </edit>
    <edit mode="assign" name="hintstyle" >
      <const>hintfull</const>
    </edit>
    <edit mode="assign" name="antialias" >
      <bool>true</bool>
    </edit>
  </match>
</fontconfig>

That worked for me.
tom


On Wed, Jul 15, 2009 at 7:43 PM, Steve72 <email address hidden> wrote:

> I have just installed 9.04 on an HP Omnibook XE3 which has an Intel
> graphics card.  It is experiencing the same problem.  When I first start
> it I can open a terminal window or firefox and read it fine, but after a
> short while it becomes less and less readable.  The text initially
> bleeds to some letters being on a grey background and a little fuzzy
> around the edges, and gradually becomes blue and unreadable (no longer
> text).
>
> Like Tom describes, other applications display fine, but these ones
> become very bad.  I have attached a picture for you.
>
>
> ** Attachment added: "Screen shot of a terminal window showing the problem"
>   http://launchpadlibrarian.net/29094612/Screenshot.png
>
> --
> Desktop: all black text has color "bleeding"
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/369275
> You received this bug notification because you are a direct subscriber
> of the bug.
>
> Status in Ubuntu: New
>
> Bug description:
> A couple days ago I installed Ubuntu 9.04 fresh (I had 8.10 and prior
> versions running on same laptop before). After I began using the new
> version, I noticed that much of the text had oddly colored shadows (see
> attachment) - i.e. black text seems to be "bleeding" other colors. This
> didn't exist in Ubuntu 8.10.
>
> This bleeding is most pronounced in Firefox and Thunderbird.  Perhaps they
> are using different font rendering "engines"?
>
> I'm running on a Dell Latitude D820 with nvidia driver 180.44. I have a
> dual head setup (external Dell 2007FP and laptop screen) using TwinView. But
> the discoloring happens on both screens and also when I don't have the
> second screen connected.
> The NVidia card is a Quadro NVS 110M - according to the NVIDIA X Server
> settings program. If I can provide any further info, please let me know.
>
> I also see this bleeding after disabling the NVIDIA driver, so maybe it's
> the x server?  Or is my video card messed up?  If it's the latter, it's an
> odd coincidence that it should happen right after the 9.04 install :-(
>  Also, if it was the video card, then wouldn't my attached screenshot NOT
> show the problem?
>
> Finally, I also went into the System->Preferences->Appeareance-Fonts and
> changed Rendering to "Monochrome" - but that didn't have any effect on
> Firefox/Thunderbird (further confirming that they don't use the system for
> rendering?)
>



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http://landofwolf.blogspot.com/