Better Ubuntu Fonts

I also like Windows fonts much better than the defaults on any Linux distributions. Well, at least the Windows XP default, Tahoma. (Also, I prefer no antialiasing at all for small font sizes, when using good TrueType fonts. Your mileage may vary!)

These days I find it very easy to get nice fonts in Ubuntu. (Gone are the days of needing to recompile Freetype with a certain option (I forget which) to get them right.)

Steps I took when last installing Ubuntu afresh

1. Put your TrueType fonts (.ttf files from Windows installation or e.g. the Microsoft Core Fonts package legally available on the web) in some directory, e.g. /usr/local/winfonts.

2. Edit /etc/fonts/local.config and add your winfont dir:

   <?xml version="1.0"?>
   <!DOCTYPE fontconfig SYSTEM "fonts.dtd">
   <!-- /etc/fonts/fonts.conf file to configure system font access -->
   <fontconfig>
           <!-- Font directory list -->
           <dir>/usr/local/winfonts</dir> 
           <dir>/usr/share/X11/fonts/misc</dir>
   </fontconfig>
   

3. Run sudo fc-cache -fv to rebuild font information cache files. (Nowadays there's no need to create files like fonts.scale, fonts.dir or fonts.alias using ttmkfdir or other utilities!)

Then configure Tahoma 8 as the default font in your desktop environment (KDE's control centre for me; equally easy in the Gnome equivalent)

And that's it.

Alternative way

Another way is to simply install msttcorefonts package from Universe and run fc-cache, as instructed in this post on Ubuntu Blog.

The core fonts package doesn't include Tahoma though. But if you have it from other sources, copying the .ttf files to ~/.fonts/ (or /usr/local/share/fonts for system wide availability) before running fc-cache should be sufficient.

I believe the default font is either:

• Windows XP: Tahoma
• Windows Vista / Windows 7: Segoe UI

You may also like Calibri. That's a nice font too.

Since you mentioned you have a windows system, you should be able to grab these licensed fonts without any drama.

I do recommend enabling Sub-pixel smoothing, makes it much easier on your eyes. Unfortunately, Firefox doesn't seem to use sub pixel smoothing, atleast for me.