[Pkg-fonts-bugs] Bug#358526: ligature problems in freefont

[Christian Perrier]

reopen 358526
retitle 358526 "st" ligature problems also show up in FreeSerif
thanks

Quoting Jan Willem Stumpel (jstumpel at planet.nl):
> Thanks for this prompt action. However, we are not there yet.
> 
> In the new version the strange st ligature in FreeSerif is still
> present and mandatory, and shows when web pages are viewed *in
> Firefox*.
> 
> The st ligature should IMHO not be used with Roman fonts. It may
> look elegant in Italic fonts, but in Roman fonts it looks just silly.

This is also my feeling and this is mostly how I will forward it
upstream.

Upstream ChangeLog explicitely says that the ligature had been changed
from mandatory ot discretionary only for FreeSans....so having it
still in FreeSerif is expected....though not really pertinent as you point.

> Also, there seems to be something wrong with the horizontal
> spacing of the st ligature (and of other ligatures in FreeSerif).
> One effect is that when a word ends with st, the following space
> shrinks to almost nothing.
> 
> This shows up only in pages in which the text is *justified*! An
> example is http://www.dur.ac.uk/m.d.eddy/HoSinDurhamHarriot.html
> 
> -- see how the supposedly "justified" text is in fact rather
>    ragged on the right when FreeSerif is used. Lines with
>    ligatures in them are too short. Somehow the width reported for
>    purposes of justification seems different from the width for
>    display.
> -- see also the strange "shifting" effect when portions of a line
>    are selected in this page.
> 
> These effects are also present with FreeSans, but to a lesser
> extent, because the often-occurring st ligature is not mandatory
> in FreeSans. With the new version of FreeMono, which neutralises
> all ligatures, the effects do not occur at all.
> 
> This may be a "new bug".


I'd say that this could veen be regarded as a different bug, which
would leave us with:

#358526 for the mandatory ligature in FreeSerif

a cloned bug for the horizontal spacing of the ligature


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