X logical font description (XLFD) is a font

standard Standard may refer to: Symbols * Colours, standards and guidons, kinds of military signs * Standard (emblem), a type of a large symbol or emblem used for identification Norms, conventions or requirements * Standard (metrology), an object ...

used by the

X Window System The X Window System (X11, or simply X) is a windowing system for bitmap displays, common on Unix-like operating systems. X provides the basic framework for a GUI environment: drawing and moving windows on the display device and interacting ...

. Modern X software typically relies on the newer

Fontconfig Fontconfig (or fontconfig) is a free software program library designed to provide configuration, enumeration and substitution of fonts to other programs. Fontconfig was originally written and maintained by Keith Packard, and is currently mainta ...

system instead, but XLFDs are still supported in current X window implementations for compatibility with

legacy In law, a legacy is something held and transferred to someone as their inheritance, as by will and testament. Personal effects, family property, marriage property or collective property gained by will of real property. Legacy or legacies may refer ...

software. XLFD is intended to support: * unique, descriptive

font In movable type, metal typesetting, a font is a particular #Characteristics, size, weight and style of a typeface. Each font is a matched set of type, with a piece (a "Sort (typesetting), sort") for each glyph. A typeface consists of a range of ...

names that support simple pattern matching * multiple font vendors, arbitrary character sets, and encodings * naming and instancing of scalable and polymorphic fonts * transformations and subsetting of fonts * independence of X server and operating or file system implementations * arbitrarily complex font matching or substitution * extensibility One prominent XLFD convention is to refer to individual fonts including any variations using their unique ''FontName''. It comprises a sequence of fourteen

hyphen The hyphen is a punctuation mark used to join words and to separate syllables of a single word. The use of hyphens is called hyphenation. ''Son-in-law'' is an example of a hyphenated word. The hyphen is sometimes confused with dashes ( figur ...

-prefixed, X-registered fields: #FOUNDRY:

Type foundry A type foundry is a company that designs or distributes typefaces. Before digital typography, type foundries manufactured and sold metal and wood typefaces for hand typesetting, and matrices for line-casting machines like the Linotype and ...

- vendor or supplier of this font #FAMILY_NAME:

Typeface A typeface (or font family) is the design of lettering that can include variations in size, weight (e.g. bold), slope (e.g. italic), width (e.g. condensed), and so on. Each of these variations of the typeface is a font. There are thousands ...

family #WEIGHT_NAME: Weight of type #SLANT: Slant (upright, ''italic'',

oblique Oblique may refer to: * an alternative name for the character usually called a slash (punctuation) ( / ) *Oblique angle, in geometry * Oblique triangle, in geometry * Oblique lattice, in geometry * Oblique leaf base, a characteristic shape of the ...

, reverse italic, reverse oblique, or "other") #SETWIDTH_NAME: Proportionate width (e.g. normal, condensed, narrow, expanded/double-wide) #ADD_STYLE_NAME: Additional style (e.g. ( Sans) Serif, Informal, Decorated) #PIXEL_SIZE: Size of characters, in

pixel In digital imaging, a pixel (abbreviated px), pel, or picture element is the smallest addressable element in a raster image, or the smallest point in an all points addressable display device. In most digital display devices, pixels are the s ...

s; 0 (

Zero 0 (zero) is a number representing an empty quantity. In place-value notation such as the Hindu–Arabic numeral system, 0 also serves as a placeholder numerical digit, which works by multiplying digits to the left of 0 by the radix, usu ...

) means a scalable font #POINT_SIZE: Size of characters, in tenths of points #RESOLUTION_X: Horizontal

resolution Resolution(s) may refer to: Common meanings * Resolution (debate), the statement which is debated in policy debate * Resolution (law), a written motion adopted by a deliberative body * New Year's resolution, a commitment that an individual ma ...

dots per inch Dots per inch (DPI, or dpiThe acronym appears in sources as either "DPI" or lowercase "dpi". See "Print Resolution Understanding 4-bit depth – Xerox" (PDF). Xerox.com. September 2012.) is a measure of spatial printing, video or image scanner ...

(DPI), for which the font was designed #RESOLUTION_Y: Vertical resolution, in DPI #SPACING:

monospaced A monospaced font, also called a fixed-pitch, fixed-width, or non-proportional font, is a font whose letters and characters each occupy the same amount of horizontal space. This contrasts with variable-width fonts, where the letters and spaci ...

proportional Proportionality, proportion or proportional may refer to: Mathematics * Proportionality (mathematics), the property of two variables being in a multiplicative relation to a constant * Ratio, of one quantity to another, especially of a part compare ...

, or "character cell" #AVERAGE_WIDTH: Average width of characters of this font; 0 means scalable font #CHARSET_REGISTRY: Registry defining this

character set Character encoding is the process of assigning numbers to graphical characters, especially the written characters of human language, allowing them to be stored, transmitted, and transformed using digital computers. The numerical values tha ...

#CHARSET_ENCODING: Registry's

character encoding Character encoding is the process of assigning numbers to graphical characters, especially the written characters of human language, allowing them to be stored, transmitted, and transformed using digital computers. The numerical values tha ...

scheme for this set The following sample is for a 75-dpi, 12-point, Charter font: -bitstream-charter-medium-r-normal--12-120-75-75-p-68-iso8859-1 5 70 80_90(which also tells the font source that the client is interested only in characters 65, 70, and 80-90.)

References

* * {{free-software-stub X Window System