「Fontconfig」- fonts.conf（学习笔记） @20210411
参考 Font configuration - ArchWiki 页面。
fonts.conf，字体配置文件。
配置文件路径及加载顺序（SYNOPSIS）
/etc/fonts/fonts.conf
/etc/fonts/fonts.dtd
/etc/fonts/conf.d
$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/fontconfig/conf.d
$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/fontconfig/fonts.conf
~/.fonts.conf.d
~/.fonts.conf
配置文件描述（DESCRIPTION）
Fontconfig是一个库，旨在提供系统范围的字体配置、定制、应用程序访问。
功能概览（FUNCTIONAL OVERVIEW）
Fontconfig contains two essential modules, the configuration module which builds an internal configuration
from XML files and the matching module which accepts font patterns and returns the nearest matching font.
FONT CONFIGURATION
The configuration module consists of the FcConfig datatype, libexpat and FcConfigParse which walks over an
XML tree and amends a configuration with data found within. From an external perspective, configuration of
the library consists of generating a valid XML tree and feeding that to FcConfigParse. The only other mecha‐
nism provided to applications for changing the running configuration is to add fonts and directories to the
list of application-provided font files.
The intent is to make font configurations relatively static, and shared by as many applications as possible.
It is hoped that this will lead to more stable font selection when passing names from one application to
another. XML was chosen as a configuration file format because it provides a format which is easy for exter‐
nal agents to edit while retaining the correct structure and syntax.
Font configuration is separate from font matching; applications needing to do their own matching can access
the available fonts from the library and perform private matching. The intent is to permit applications to
pick and choose appropriate functionality from the library instead of forcing them to choose between this
library and a private configuration mechanism. The hope is that this will ensure that configuration of fonts
for all applications can be centralized in one place. Centralizing font configuration will simplify and regu‐
larize font installation and customization.
字体的属性（FONT PROPERTIES）
While font patterns may contain essentially any properties, there are some well known properties with associ‐
ated types. Fontconfig uses some of these properties for font matching and font completion. Others are pro‐
vided as a convenience for the applications' rendering mechanism.
Property Type Description -------------------------------------------------------------- family String Font family names familylang String Languages corresponding to each family style String Font style. Overrides weight and slant stylelang String Languages corresponding to each style fullname String Font full names (often includes style) fullnamelang String Languages corresponding to each fullname slant Int Italic, oblique or roman weight Int Light, medium, demibold, bold or black size Double Point size width Int Condensed, normal or expanded aspect Double Stretches glyphs horizontally before hinting pixelsize Double Pixel size spacing Int Proportional, dual-width, monospace or charcell foundry String Font foundry name antialias Bool Whether glyphs can be antialiased hinting Bool Whether the rasterizer should use hinting hintstyle Int Automatic hinting style verticallayout Bool Use vertical layout autohint Bool Use autohinter instead of normal hinter globaladvance Bool Use font global advance data (deprecated) file String The filename holding the font index Int The index of the font within the file ftface FT_Face Use the specified FreeType face object rasterizer String Which rasterizer is in use (deprecated) outline Bool Whether the glyphs are outlines scalable Bool Whether glyphs can be scaled color Bool Whether any glyphs have color scale Double Scale factor for point->pixel conversions (deprecated) dpi Double Target dots per inch rgba Int unknown, rgb, bgr, vrgb, vbgr, none - subpixel geometry lcdfilter Int Type of LCD filter minspace Bool Eliminate leading from line spacing charset CharSet Unicode chars encoded by the font lang String List of RFC-3066-style languages this font supports fontversion Int Version number of the font capability String List of layout capabilities in the font fontformat String String name of the font format embolden Bool Rasterizer should synthetically embolden the font embeddedbitmap Bool Use the embedded bitmap instead of the outline decorative Bool Whether the style is a decorative variant fontfeatures String List of the feature tags in OpenType to be enabled namelang String Language name to be used for the default value of familylang, stylelang, and fullnamelang prgname String String Name of the running program postscriptname String Font family name in PostScript
字体匹配（FONT MATCHING）
Fontconfig performs matching by measuring the distance from a provided pattern to all of the available fonts
in the system. The closest matching font is selected. This ensures that a font will always be returned, but
doesn't ensure that it is anything like the requested pattern.
Font matching starts with an application constructed pattern. The desired attributes of the resulting font
are collected together in a pattern. Each property of the pattern can contain one or more values; these are
listed in priority order; matches earlier in the list are considered "closer" than matches later in the list.
The initial pattern is modified by applying the list of editing instructions specific to patterns found in
the configuration; each consists of a match predicate and a set of editing operations. They are executed in
the order they appeared in the configuration. Each match causes the associated sequence of editing operations
to be applied.
After the pattern has been edited, a sequence of default substitutions are performed to canonicalize the set
of available properties; this avoids the need for the lower layers to constantly provide default values for
various font properties during rendering.
The canonical font pattern is finally matched against all available fonts. The distance from the pattern to
the font is measured for each of several properties: foundry, charset, family, lang, spacing, pixelsize,
style, slant, weight, antialias, rasterizer and outline. This list is in priority order -- results of compar‐
ing earlier elements of this list weigh more heavily than later elements.
There is one special case to this rule; family names are split into two bindings; strong and weak. Strong
family names are given greater precedence in the match than lang elements while weak family names are given
lower precedence than lang elements. This permits the document language to drive font selection when any doc‐
ument specified font is unavailable.
The pattern representing that font is augmented to include any properties found in the pattern but not found
in the font itself; this permits the application to pass rendering instructions or any other data through the
matching system. Finally, the list of editing instructions specific to fonts found in the configuration are
applied to the pattern. This modified pattern is returned to the application.
The return value contains sufficient information to locate and rasterize the font, including the file name,
pixel size and other rendering data. As none of the information involved pertains to the FreeType library,
applications are free to use any rasterization engine or even to take the identified font file and access it
directly.
The match/edit sequences in the configuration are performed in two passes because there are essentially two
different operations necessary -- the first is to modify how fonts are selected; aliasing families and adding
suitable defaults. The second is to modify how the selected fonts are rasterized. Those must apply to the
selected font, not the original pattern as false matches will often occur.
FONT NAMES
Fontconfig provides a textual representation for patterns that the library can both accept and generate. The
representation is in three parts, first a list of family names, second a list of point sizes and finally a
list of additional properties:
<families>-<point sizes>:<name1>=<values1>:<name2>=<values2>...
Values in a list are separated with commas. The name needn't include either families or point sizes; they can
be elided. In addition, there are symbolic constants that simultaneously indicate both a name and a value.
Here are some examples:
Name Meaning ---------------------------------------------------------- Times-12 12 point Times Roman Times-12:bold 12 point Times Bold Courier:italic Courier Italic in the default size Monospace:matrix=1 .1 0 1 The users preferred monospace font with artificial obliquing
The '\', '-', ':' and ',' characters in family names must be preceded by a '\' character to avoid having them
misinterpreted. Similarly, values containing '\', '=', '_', ':' and ',' must also have them preceded by a '\'
character. The '\' characters are stripped out of the family name and values as the font name is read.
LANG TAGS
Each font in the database contains a list of languages it supports. This is computed by comparing the Unicode
coverage of the font with the orthography of each language. Languages are tagged using an RFC-3066 compatible
naming and occur in two parts -- the ISO 639 language tag followed a hyphen and then by the ISO 3166 country
code. The hyphen and country code may be elided.
Fontconfig has orthographies for several languages built into the library. No provision has been made for
adding new ones aside from rebuilding the library. It currently supports 122 of the 139 languages named in
ISO 639-1, 141 of the languages with two-letter codes from ISO 639-2 and another 30 languages with only
three-letter codes. Languages with both two and three letter codes are provided with only the two letter
code.
For languages used in multiple territories with radically different character sets, fontconfig includes per-
territory orthographies. This includes Azerbaijani, Kurdish, Pashto, Tigrinya and Chinese.
配置文件的格式（CONFIGURATION FILE FORMAT）
fontconfig的配置文件以XML格式存储；这种格式使其他的配置工具更容易写入并确保它们将生成语法正确的配置文件。
由于XML文件是纯文本的，所以也可以直接编辑。
fontconfig文档类型定义位于外部实体“fonts.dtd”中；通常存储在默认字体配置目录（/etc/fonts）中。每个配置文件应包含以下结构：
<?xml version="1.0"?> <!DOCTYPE fontconfig SYSTEM "fonts.dtd"> <fontconfig> <!-- ... --> </fontconfig>
<FONTCONFIG>
字体配置中的顶级元素，可以以任意顺序包含<dir>, <cachedir>, <include>, <match>, <alias>元素。
<DIR PREFIX="DEFAULT">
该元素用于指定一个目录名，该目录名用于扫描字体文件，并将其包含在可用字体集中。
如果'prefix'设置为“xdg”，则环境变量XDG_DATA_HOME的值将作为路径的前缀。
有关详细信息，参阅《XDG Base Directory Specification》。
<CACHEDIR PREFIX="DEFAULT">
This element contains a directory name that is supposed to be stored or read the cache of font information.
If multiple elements are specified in the configuration file, the directory that can be accessed first in the
list will be used to store the cache files. If it starts with '~', it refers to a directory in the users home
directory. If 'prefix' is set to "xdg", the value in the XDG_CACHE_HOME environment variable will be added as
the path prefix. please see XDG Base Directory Specification for more details. The default directory is
``$XDG_CACHE_HOME/fontconfig'' and it contains the cache files named ``<hash value>-<architec‐
ture>.cache-<version>'', where <version> is the fontconfig cache file version number (currently 7).
<INCLUDE IGNORE_MISSING="NO" PREFIX="DEFAULT">
This element contains the name of an additional configuration file or directory. If a directory, every file
within that directory starting with an ASCII digit (U+0030 - U+0039) and ending with the string ``.conf''
will be processed in sorted order. When the XML datatype is traversed by FcConfigParse, the contents of the
file(s) will also be incorporated into the configuration by passing the filename(s) to FcConfigLoadAndParse.
If 'ignore_missing' is set to "yes" instead of the default "no", a missing file or directory will elicit no
warning message from the library. If 'prefix' is set to "xdg", the value in the XDG_CONFIG_HOME environment
variable will be added as the path prefix. please see XDG Base Directory Specification for more details.
<CONFIG>
This element provides a place to consolidate additional configuration information. <config> can contain
<blank> and <rescan> elements in any order.
<BLANK>
Fonts often include "broken" glyphs which appear in the encoding but are drawn as blanks on the screen.
Within the <blank> element, place each Unicode characters which is supposed to be blank in an <int> element.
Characters outside of this set which are drawn as blank will be elided from the set of characters supported
by the font.
<RESCAN>
The <rescan> element holds an <int> element which indicates the default interval between automatic checks for
font configuration changes. Fontconfig will validate all of the configuration files and directories and
automatically rebuild the internal datastructures when this interval passes.
<SELECTFONT>
This element is used to black/white list fonts from being listed or matched against. It holds acceptfont and
rejectfont elements.
<ACCEPTFONT>
Fonts matched by an acceptfont element are "whitelisted"; such fonts are explicitly included in the set of
fonts used to resolve list and match requests; including them in this list protects them from being "black‐
listed" by a rejectfont element. Acceptfont elements include glob and pattern elements which are used to
match fonts.
<REJECTFONT>
Fonts matched by an rejectfont element are "blacklisted"; such fonts are excluded from the set of fonts used
to resolve list and match requests as if they didn't exist in the system. Rejectfont elements include glob
and pattern elements which are used to match fonts.
<GLOB>
Glob elements hold shell-style filename matching patterns (including ? and *) which match fonts based on
their complete pathnames. This can be used to exclude a set of directories (/usr/share/fonts/uglyfont*), or
particular font file types (*.pcf.gz), but the latter mechanism relies rather heavily on filenaming conven‐
tions which can't be relied upon. Note that globs only apply to directories, not to individual fonts.
<PATTERN>
Pattern elements perform list-style matching on incoming fonts; that is, they hold a list of elements and
associated values. If all of those elements have a matching value, then the pattern matches the font. This
can be used to select fonts based on attributes of the font (scalable, bold, etc), which is a more reliable
mechanism than using file extensions. Pattern elements include patelt elements.
<PATELT NAME="PROPERTY">
Patelt elements hold a single pattern element and list of values. They must have a 'name' attribute which
indicates the pattern element name. Patelt elements include int, double, string, matrix, bool, charset and
const elements.
<MATCH TARGET="PATTERN">
This element holds first a (possibly empty) list of <test> elements and then a (possibly empty) list of
<edit> elements. Patterns which match all of the tests are subjected to all the edits. If 'target' is set to
"font" instead of the default "pattern", then this element applies to the font name resulting from a match
rather than a font pattern to be matched. If 'target' is set to "scan", then this element applies when the
font is scanned to build the fontconfig database.
<TEST QUAL="ANY" NAME="PROPERTY" TARGET="DEFAULT" COMPARE="EQ">
This element contains a single value which is compared with the target ('pattern', 'font', 'scan' or
'default') property "property" (substitute any of the property names seen above).
'compare' can be one of "eq", "not_eq", "less", "less_eq", "more", "more_eq", "contains" or "not_contains".
'qual' may either be the default, "any", in which case the match succeeds if any value associated with the property matches the test
value, or "all", in which case all of the values associated with the property must match the test value.
'ignore-blanks' takes a boolean value. if 'ignore-blanks' is set "true", any blanks in the string will be
ignored on its comparison. this takes effects only when compare="eq" or compare="not_eq". When used in a
<match target="font"> element, the target= attribute in the <test> element selects between matching the orig‐
inal pattern or the font. "default" selects whichever target the outer <match> element has selected.
<EDIT NAME="PROPERTY" MODE="ASSIGN" BINDING="WEAK">
This element contains a list of expression elements (any of the value or operator elements). The expression
elements are evaluated at run-time and modify the property "property". The modification depends on whether
"property" was matched by one of the associated <test> elements, if so, the modification may affect the first
matched value. Any values inserted into the property are given the indicated binding ("strong", "weak" or
"same") with "same" binding using the value from the matched pattern element.
'mode' is one of:
Mode With Match Without Match --------------------------------------------------------------------- "assign" Replace matching value Replace all values "assign_replace" Replace all values Replace all values "prepend" Insert before matching Insert at head of list "prepend_first" Insert at head of list Insert at head of list "append" Append after matching Append at end of list "append_last" Append at end of list Append at end of list "delete" Delete matching value Delete all values "delete_all" Delete all values Delete all values
<INT>, <DOUBLE>, <STRING>, <BOOL>
These elements hold a single value of the indicated type. <bool> elements hold either true or false. An
important limitation exists in the parsing of floating point numbers -- fontconfig requires that the mantissa
start with a digit, not a decimal point, so insert a leading zero for purely fractional values (e.g. use 0.5
instead of .5 and -0.5 instead of -.5).
<MATRIX>
This element holds four numerical expressions of an affine transformation. At their simplest these will be
four <double> elements but they can also be more involved expressions.
<RANGE>
This element holds the two <int> elements of a range representation.
<CHARSET>
This element holds at least one <int> element of an Unicode code point or more.
<LANGSET>
This element holds at least one <string> element of a RFC-3066-style languages or more.
<NAME>
Holds a property name. Evaluates to the first value from the property of the pattern. If the 'target'
attribute is not present, it will default to 'default', in which case the property is returned from the font
pattern during a target="font" match, and to the pattern during a target="pattern" match. The attribute can
also take the values 'font' or 'pattern' to explicitly choose which pattern to use. It is an error to use a
target of 'font' in a match that has target="pattern".
<CONST>
Holds the name of a constant; these are always integers and serve as symbolic names for common font values:
Constant Property Value ------------------------------------- thin weight 0 extralight weight 40 ultralight weight 40 light weight 50 demilight weight 55 semilight weight 55 book weight 75 regular weight 80 normal weight 80 medium weight 100 demibold weight 180 semibold weight 180 bold weight 200 extrabold weight 205 black weight 210 heavy weight 210 roman slant 0 italic slant 100 oblique slant 110 ultracondensed width 50 extracondensed width 63 condensed width 75 semicondensed width 87 normal width 100 semiexpanded width 113 expanded width 125 extraexpanded width 150 ultraexpanded width 200 proportional spacing 0 dual spacing 90 mono spacing 100 charcell spacing 110 unknown rgba 0 rgb rgba 1 bgr rgba 2 vrgb rgba 3 vbgr rgba 4 none rgba 5 lcdnone lcdfilter 0 lcddefault lcdfilter 1 lcdlight lcdfilter 2 lcdlegacy lcdfilter 3 hintnone hintstyle 0 hintslight hintstyle 1 hintmedium hintstyle 2 hintfull hintstyle 3
<OR>, <AND>, <PLUS>, <MINUS>, <TIMES>, <DIVIDE>
These elements perform the specified operation on a list of expression elements. <or> and <and> are boolean,
not bitwise.
<EQ>, <NOT_EQ>, <LESS>, <LESS_EQ>, <MORE>, <MORE_EQ>, <CONTAINS>, <NOT_CONTAINS
These elements compare two values, producing a boolean result.
<NOT>
Inverts the boolean sense of its one expression element
<IF>
This element takes three expression elements; if the value of the first is true, it produces the value of the
second, otherwise it produces the value of the third.
<ALIAS>
ALIAS元素提供了简写符号，将一个字体系替换为另一个所需的一组常规匹配操作。
它们包含一个<family>元素，后跟可选的<prefer>，<accept>，<default>元素。
用于编辑与<family>元素匹配的字体：
在匹配**<family>之前**，添加**<prefer>**中的**<family>**列表； 在匹配**<family>之后**，附加**<accept>**中的**<family>**列表； 再将**<default>**列表中的**<family>**添加到family名单中；
<FAMILY>
包含单一字体系名称。
<PREFER>, <ACCEPT>, <DEFAULT>
这些标签包含了由多个<family>元素组成的列表，该列表被<alias>元素使用的。
相关的文件（FILES）
fonts.conf
contains configuration information for the fontconfig library consisting of directories to look at
for font information as well as instructions on editing program specified font patterns before attempting to
match the available fonts. It is in XML format.
conf.d
is the conventional name for a directory of additional configuration files managed by external appli‐
cations or the local administrator. The filenames starting with decimal digits are sorted in lexicographic
order and used as additional configuration files. All of these files are in XML format. The master fonts.conf
file references this directory in an <include> directive.
fonts.dtd
is a DTD that describes the format of the configuration files.
$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/fontconfig/conf.d and ~/.fonts.conf.d
is the conventional name for a per-user directory of
(typically auto-generated) configuration files, although the actual location is specified in the global
fonts.conf file. please note that ~/.fonts.conf.d is deprecated now. it will not be read by default in the
future version.
$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/fontconfig/fonts.conf and ~/.fonts.conf
is the conventional location for per-user font con‐
figuration, although the actual location is specified in the global fonts.conf file. please note that
~/.fonts.conf is deprecated now. it will not be read by default in the future version.
$XDG_CACHE_HOME/fontconfig/*.cache-* and ~/.fontconfig/*.cache-*
is the conventional repository of font
information that isn't found in the per-directory caches. This file is automatically maintained by fontcon‐
fig. please note that ~/.fontconfig/*.cache-* is deprecated now. it will not be read by default in the future
version.
环境变量（ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES）
FONTCONFIG_FILE
is used to override the default configuration file.
FONTCONFIG_PATH
is used to override the default configuration directory.
FC_DEBUG
is used to output the detailed debugging messages. see Debugging Applications section for more details.
FC_DBG_MATCH_FILTER
is used to filter out the patterns. this takes a comma-separated list of object names and
effects only when FC_DEBUG has MATCH2. see Debugging Applications section for more details.
FC_LANG
is used to specify the default language as the weak binding in the query. if this isn't set, the
default language will be determined from current locale.
FONTCONFIG_USE_MMAP
is used to control the use of mmap(2) for the cache files if available. this take a boolean value.
fontconfig will checks if the cache files are stored on the filesystem that is safe to use
mmap(2). explicitly setting this environment variable will causes skipping this check and enforce to use or
not use mmap(2) anyway.
相关文档（SEE ALSO）
fc-cat(1), fc-cache(1), fc-list(1), fc-match(1), fc-query(1)
参考文献
man 5 fonts-conf, version fontconfig version 2.12.3
fonts.conf 中文手册: http://www.jinbuguo.com/gui/fonts.conf.html