FontSmoother

[Joel]

Smoothed fonts (antialiased fonts) decrease the "jagginess" of bitmap fonts. FontSmoother lets you use smooth fonts in most applications on your OS 5 PDA (except for Tapwave and Treo 600) with Fonts4OS5 3.20+. [details (http://www.1src.com/?m=show&id=777)]

[Jeff Kirvin]

ATTENTION ZODIAC USERS: If you want to use this on the Zod, email Igor Nesterov nest at palmoid.com and let him know you need a copy of YAHM that works on the Zodiac! That's the only part we're missing. He just needs to get YAHM Tapwave signed and we can enjoy smooth, easy-to-read fonts too.

[pruss]

ATTENTION ZODIAC USERS: If you want to use this on the Zod, email Igor Nesterov nest at palmoid.com and let him know you need a copy of YAHM that works on the Zodiac! That's the only part we're missing. He just needs to get YAHM Tapwave signed and we can enjoy smooth, easy-to-read fonts too.

I doubt Tapwave will sign YAHM, since by doing so, they would be putting a ten foot hole in their security, as YAHM can then run unsigned applications (i.e., hacks).

That said, I don't know what the point of the signing is. Is it to prevent malicious or buggy software from screwing things up? Or is it to support DRM schemes? If the former, then Tapwave could perhaps be persuaded that with enough disclaimers, users should be allowed to make their own decisions. If the latter, there is no hope.

[MetaView]

Signing is to access their restricted APIs. The question is, why would a hackmanager need access to the special TW API? Doesn't make much sense...

[jjesusfreak01]

As I always say, i'm not a programmer, but aren't hacks all about accessing special system functions. With hack access from YAHM, it would allow access to all the cool functions, opening the door for Zodiac specific hacks. It wouldnt be too long before a hack would be out to bypass the signing procedure. Oops, I shouldn't have said that.

By the way, everyone should buy FontSmoother, its the best.

Some AvantGo pics, You get to guess which is using FontSmoother.

[pruss]

Signing is to access their restricted APIs. The question is, why would a hackmanager need access to the special TW API? Doesn't make much sense...

The function for patching syscalls is restricted.

[Greg Jones]

Some AvantGo pics, You get to guess which is using FontSmoother.

Very nice contrast! Is that font one that is included in the demo of FontSmoother or is it from somewhere else. I like it.

[wellsjs]

I would be interested in a font and settings to get an antialiased font to work with eReader so that text flows correctly when "paging?" Help? :)

[tanker_bob]

I love FontSmoother together with Fonts4OS5 3.21 on my T3. Be sure to go to Lubak's website (http://www.lubak.net) to get his 6.2MB of AA fonts in addition to the nice ones that Dr. Pruss includes with the FontSmoother package. I have a different font for readers like HandStory and for general apps and utilities. Way cool!

[pruss]

I would be interested in a font and settings to get an antialiased font to work with eReader so that text flows correctly when "paging?" Help? :)

I haven't had any trouble with any font if used correctly. Are you using Fonts4OS5 or fonts specially generated for eReader (see the FontHack_fonts directory in the FontSmoother distribution)?

If you use Fonts4OS5 to change eReader fonts, eReader doesn't know about the change, and so you need to force eReader to repaginate. Other people may have other tricks for forcing eReader to repaginate: I just rotate a couple of times and switch to a couple of different fonts, and soon the pagination cache is overwritten, and switching to the font and orientation I want forces a repagination.

If you use eReader/FontHack fonts, you don't need to worry about this.

[pruss]

I love FontSmoother together with Fonts4OS5 3.21 on my T3. Be sure to go to Lubak's website (http://www.lubak.net) to get his 6.2MB of AA fonts in addition to the nice ones that Dr. Pruss includes with the FontSmoother package. I have a different font for readers like HandStory and for general apps and utilities. Way cool!

I should add that Lubak's fonts will actually look nicer than generating your own fonts with PalmFontConv. That is because Lubak is in Europe where they don't have as restrictive software patent restrictions, and so he is allowed to use a specially compiled version of PalmFontConv with better Apple-patented hinting support, which PalmFontConv users in the U.S. cannot legally use (without my paying $20K or so to Apple, which I can't afford).

[Greg Jones]

What is the demo period for FontSmoother? I installed it a little more than 12 hours ago and it is already expired. I did pay for it yesterday through ZLThemes, but have not received the registration info yet.

[tanker_bob]

I think that it's 8 days. I tested it in an earlier beta version and it worked OK. What device are you using?

[wellsjs]

pruss,

Thanks for your help with eReader fonts and repagination. I now have a very nice antialiased font working with it and it's beautiful. Pushed me over the edge to purchase Fontsmoother! ;) :)

[Greg Jones]

I am using a T3 and never had any version of FS installed before yesterday. Viewing "Config" in YAHM reports "Expired: register at zlthemes.com."

[pruss]

I am using a T3 and never had any version of FS installed before yesterday. Viewing "Config" in YAHM reports "Expired: register at zlthemes.com."

Interesting bug. Could you tell me what you did when you first installed it? (Did you first click on the config, did you just enable it without clicking on config, etc.) This way I can try to figure out how to duplicate the expiration.

Anyway, I sent you a reg code yesterday at 17:56 EST. I just resent it to you (and I gave you free FontCollector and SkinDIA! reg codes as an apology for any trouble). Email me if you didn't get it.

Alex

[Greg Jones]

Registration info received-thanks! Also thanks for the bonus registration files. I am already a registered user of SkinDIA and I will also check out FontCollector.

I really cannot recall for certain, but I expect that I enabled it without clicking on config. It is working fine now that I installed the registration file. Let me know if there is anything else I can try to help you track down the problem.

[the_iceman]

Yet another in the list of AWESOME applications by Pruss. We would like to thank you for all your work on this one Alex!!!!!!!!!! Smooth Text... ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh :)

[pruss]

Registration info received-thanks! Also thanks for the bonus registration files. I am already a registered user of SkinDIA and I will also check out FontCollector.

I really cannot recall for certain, but I expect that I enabled it without clicking on config. It is working fine now that I installed the registration file. Let me know if there is anything else I can try to help you track down the problem.

My guess is that the best way to figure this out will be to see if it repeats for anybody else. Could you email me a list of the applications you have on your PDA? This way if I get another report, I can see which apps are in common, and that might narrow things down.

I had this problem with SkinT3!. It turned out its trial data was conflicting with IconFix's. I don't think this is the case for FontSmoother.

[mikegehl]

It happened for me, too. Immediately had a message that I should register.

[pruss]

I'll have to check the registration code again.

By the way, there is now a $1 off discount code for 1src users interested in FontSmoother until the end of January: "1SRCUSER5". Works on palmgear and zlthemes.

[Malial]

Does this work on the T5?

I've installed it on my T5 and tried using it with both YAHM and Fonts4OS5 and it doesn't appear to be smoothing any fonts.

[jjesusfreak01]

You have to also install AA fonts to use it. It will not smooth normal fonts. This is way too complicated a task to do on a handheld device.

[pruss]

You have to also install AA fonts to use it. It will not smooth normal fonts. This is way to complicated a task to do on a handheld device.

Actually, it's way too complicated a task to do on any device: computers don't really know which parts of a bitmapped font should be smoothed and where the sharp corners should be. That's why smooth fonts need to be generated from TrueType and Type 1 fonts. Theoretically, I could build a Palm-based generator, but it would be a lot of work. I think OS 6 will include smooth TrueType font rendering.

[Malial]

You have to also install AA fonts to use it. It will not smooth normal fonts. This is way to complicated a task to do on a handheld device.


I installed the fonts that were supplied with FontSmoother and activated those, but it didn't seem any smoother to me.

[mikegehl]

Same here, Alex.

Neither the fonts in the 6+ MB zip file from Lubak nor the fonts included with FontSmoother seem to be displayed anti-aliased.

I'm also using a T5.

Mike

[akira28]

Alex.

Why is the Zodiac not able to run Fontsmoother? Can YAHM, in fact, help? Are there plans to implement it in the future?



Font Collector Registered user

[pruss]

I installed the fonts that were supplied with FontSmoother and activated those, but it didn't seem any smoother to me.

Could you go to the setup in YAHM (tap on the + to the right of "FontSmoother") and check if it is expired or not?

Thanks!
Alex

[pruss]

Why is the Zodiac not able to run Fontsmoother? Can YAHM, in fact, help? Are there plans to implement it in the future?

YAHM does not run on Tapwave, and will not run on Tapwave unless Igor manages to crack the digital signing or Tapwave decides to digitally sign YAHM.

[lubak]

I installed the fonts that were supplied with FontSmoother and activated those, but it didn't seem any smoother to me.
Malial,
what font you use?
I test all on my TT5 and all is O.K.

[jjesusfreak01]

YAHM does not run on Tapwave, and will not run on Tapwave unless Igor manages to crack the digital signing or Tapwave decides to digitally sign YAHM.
Does anyone know how to crack the digital signing mechanism? That would be useful to alot of people. I guess, mainly Igor, but I dont think there is anyone but Tapwave who doesnt want this done. Anyway, Tapwave has plausible deniability against Nintendo if the mechanism is cracked and Firestorm can run using the sytem calls and special processors.

[akira28]

@ Alex

Does Fontsmoother require YAHM? If not why won't it run on the Zodiac?




Font Collector Registered user

[Malial]

Could you go to the setup in YAHM (tap on the + to the right of "FontSmoother") and check if it is expired or not?

Thanks!
Alex

Aha!....Yes. It does say expired.

[pruss]

Aha!....Yes. It does say expired.

OK, so that's a bug. No idea what the cause could be. If you're willing to email me your Saved Preferences database (I promise I won't look at any private data) to arpruss at gmail dot com, I might be able to have more ideas. Or I might send you a different version that might work better. Just email me.

[mikegehl]

Okay - I figured out my problem.

I'm a registered user of TealMaster, so I assumed the hack would work fine with it - the same way it would with YAHM. I never installed YAHM, but now after doing so, everything seems to work fine.

Everything looks great!
Mike

[pruss]

Yes: YAHM is needed. TealMaster is for pre-OS5 hacks.

But what you sent me also helped me find a bug that reduced the trial period from 8 days to 19 hours. This bug is fixed in 1.01, released on palmgear and zlthemes now.

[Malial]

Ok...Finally got it all installed correctly and running. Thanks for the help Alex!

One question - It really slows down my device with certain apps....Primarily Agendus Pro. Anyone else having this?

Other than that this looks great!

[mikegehl]

Maybe you had to register on 1src for it to work. ;) Welcome aboard.

You're right. Screen redraws are pretty slow.

[jjesusfreak01]

Ok...Finally got it all installed correctly and running. Thanks for the help Alex!

One question - It really slows down my device with certain apps....Primarily Agendus Pro. Anyone else having this?

Other than that this looks great!
Being a YAHM hack, it is easy to turn it off for specific apps. I, for one, have it turned off for Netfront, because it really slows it down. Avantgo is fine, as long as i am not viewing online sites.

[pruss]

Yes, it is slow. I've tried to make it fast, but there is only so much one can do...

[Tixx]

Looks nice pruss.:) I was reluctant to try it having to use YAHM and such, but glad I did. They make my Clie look so pretty!:D

[pruss]

Looks nice pruss.:) I was reluctant to try it having to use YAHM and such, but glad I did. They make my Clie look so pretty!:D

Thanks! In my experience, YAHM hacks are often more stable than standalone utilities.

Alex

[Jukov]

Couldn't make it work.... If someone (pruss :-))would just post a step by step how-to.....

[pruss]

Couldn't make it work.... If someone (pruss :-))would just post a step by step how-to.....

Did you follow the step by step instructions in the readme.html file?

[Jukov]

Yes, but nothing have happened. I mean no font change at all, after installation

[tanker_bob]

Couple of quick thoughts:

1) did you enable FontSmoother in YAHM by putting a check next to it?
2) did you tap the + next to FontSmoother in YAHM and activate it for the apps you want it to support or tap ALL?
3) did you use the AA fonts included and assign them either individually, by category, or for all apps using Fonts4OS5?

The directions in the HTML help file work if followed exactly.

[sbkoh]

There appears to be a problem with reverse highlight. Look at the display of the 3rd item :

http://home.pacific.net.sg/~sbkoh/reverse-highlight-problem.jpg

This is on my Tungsten T. Anyone else seeing this?

[JJF01]

There appears to be a problem with reverse highlight. Look at the display of the 3rd item :

http://home.pacific.net.sg/~sbkoh/reverse-highlight-problem.jpg

This is on my Tungsten T. Anyone else seeing this?
Youre going to have to ignore that for now. Its one of the downsides of the hack. This type of stuff happens when you make the system do something that wasnt intended. If possible, this may be fixed in a later release.

[tanker_bob]

You'll find the many if not all Palm OS screenshot programs have similar problems, even though the fonts look great on the screen. There's a nice illustration of how antialiasing works here (http://www.micrium.com/contents/products/GUI/Antialias.htm). That might give some idea of why this is so difficult to achieve in an OS that doesn't support it. Dr. Pruss and Lubak have put a huge amount of effort into this support. The real miracle is that Dr. Pruss solved the horizontal spacing issue in input fields. The minor reverse highlighting issue is a small price to pay for the beauty of these fonts.

[Jukov]

Couple of quick thoughts:

1) did you enable FontSmoother in YAHM by putting a check next to it?
2) did you tap the + next to FontSmoother in YAHM and activate it for the apps you want it to support or tap ALL?
3) did you use the AA fonts included and assign them either individually, by category, or for all apps using Fonts4OS5?

The directions in the HTML help file work if followed exactly.


Done that, - no resuit ..... :confused:

[na2rboy]

Does it say "Expired: register at zlthemes.com" at the top of the config menu in YAHM?

[pruss]

There appears to be a problem with reverse highlight. Look at the display of the 3rd item :
...
This is on my Tungsten T. Anyone else seeing this?

The manual explicitly says that highlighting may be ugly in some programs. The problem is that some apps, as well as the OS in its table code, highlight by swapping black<-->white and white<-->blue (other colors if you have another color scheme). This leaves the gray fringes of antialiased text unchanged, and looks bad. It's a tradeoff. You can turn off antialiased text for apps where this matters to you.

Here's a cure at the expense of changing your color scheme. Get Khroma or Colorize (both are free and on palmgear). Set Object SelectedFore color to your normal foreground color (typically black) or something fairly close to it (e.g., navy blue). Set Object SelectedFill color to a light highlight color, e.g., bright yellow or light green or light blue. The fringing effect on selected text will still happen, but will be MUCH less obvious.

I could fairly easily fix the problem completely in cases where the OS does it (I might not, though, because the OS part of it is a small part of the equation, surprisingly enough), but it's a lot harder to fix in those cases, because I'd have to guess from the sequence of operations that this is what the app is trying to do, and then replace it by a color replacement that replaces each of the 16 shades of gray that are used to render antialiased text with shades of blue text (or whatever shade the color scheme provides). This can be done but will be a slow pixel-by-pixel operation, and there are some technical difficulties with implementing it.

I should note that some apps where this happens will also, I expect, show this problem if a future PalmOS release includes antialiased fonts.

In case of 3rd party apps, you can always write the developer asking them to fix it. It's very easy to fix given source code: After doing the rectangle color invert, just write in the text once again, but with colors inverted.


A higher priority for me is to get antialiased fonts to coexist with Chinese/Japanese/Korean. (No, I'm not going to have antialiased CJK fonts. But it would be nice if the Latin portions were antialiased.) This is close to done. I've also fixed some bugs that occurred when applications were switched in some way other than by launching them. A new version should be out in a couple of days.

[pruss]

Done that, - no resuit ..... :confused:

You have a checkmark to the left of "FontSmoother" in YAHM, I take it. If you go to preview one of the antialiased fonts in Fonts4OS5, does it show up smoothed on screen?

[sbkoh]

I could fairly easily fix the problem completely in cases where the OS does it (I might not, though, because the OS part of it is a small part of the equation, surprisingly enough), but it's a lot harder to fix in those cases, because I'd have to guess from the sequence of operations that this is what the app is trying to do, and then replace it by a color replacement that replaces each of the 16 shades of gray that are used to render antialiased text with shades of blue text (or whatever shade the color scheme provides). This can be done but will be a slow pixel-by-pixel operation, and there are some technical difficulties with implementing it.


Since it is easy to fix the reverse highlighting for the Palm OS table code, could you please put it in so that at least apps like Datebk5 would hopefully be rid of this problem. Fontsmoother is an amazing program! It is to PalmOS what Clear Type is to WinXP! Kudos Dr Pruss! :D

[pruss]

Since it is easy to fix the reverse highlighting for the Palm OS table code, could you please put it in so that at least apps like Datebk5 would hopefully be rid of this problem. Fontsmoother is an amazing program! It is to PalmOS what Clear Type is to WinXP! Kudos Dr Pruss! :D

My feeling is that it's not going to do much for anyone. But for what it's worth, a partial Palm OS table highlighting fix (only partial, sorry) will be included in the next version. I have a feeling that the highlighting is rarely done through the OS. I think what is happening is that developers are re-using the highlighting code from PalmOS's PIM applications. Email me (arpruss at gmail dot com) if you'd like to beta test the next release to see if this helps with DateBk5 (which I don't have).

[strider_mt2k]

I'm completely new to the use of other fonts on my handheld.

After hearing Podcast #7, I DLed Fonts 4 OS5, FontSmoother, and the latest version of YAHM.
Very cool stuff!
I''m a MobiPocket Pro user too, and it's just great with smooth easy reading fonts.
I'm even happy to see a reason to bring good old YAHM back to my handheld.
I converted to YAHM in my OS4 days (not all that long ago) and it's king as far as I'm concerned.

Thanks for all your great work! My registration(s) are fourthcoming -fifthcoming even! (Sorry I couldn't resist!) :D

[PCMaven]

Just tried Font Smoother and with Datebk5 the upper date on my TH55 stretches out too much when using the new Comic Sans 16AA fonts. Just looks off a bit. Don't know if it's the font or fontsmoother causing the problem. This is one of Lubak's fonts. Attaching Screen capture...

[alexPruss]

Just tried Font Smoother and with Datebk5 the upper date on my TH55 stretches out too much when using the new Comic Sans 16AA fonts. Just looks off a bit. Don't know if it's the font or fontsmoother causing the problem. This is one of Lubak's fonts. Attaching Screen capture...

Looks like the font is a bit fatter than the standard font.

Alex Pruss

[PCMaven]

Would you know of any comparable comic sans serif smooth fonts that I could try?

[tanker_bob]

The only AA fonts extant for this setup are Lubak's and those that Dr. Pruss includes with FontSmoother. You can use FontConv 1.50 to convert Windows TT and other fonts, but I've not had good results converting TT fonts.

[PCMaven]

I'm actually pretty happy with Fonts4OS5 as it stands using Comic Sans Serif 22 for Datebk5 and Tungsten 22 for everything else. I may just stay using what I've been using for a while...Thanks for the reply!

[tanker_bob]

I'm actually pretty happy with Fonts4OS5 as it stands using Comic Sans Serif 22 for Datebk5 and Tungsten 22 for everything else. I may just stay using what I've been using for a while...Thanks for the reply!
You're welcome. I also used Comic Sans Serif 22 in Datebk5 (and most everything else) before FontSmoother. Now I use Trebuchet 17 AA which also looks great but doesn't have the wideness issue. I use Comic Sans 18 AA in almost everything else, Alethe Serif 17 AA ker in reading programs like Handstory, and Formal 18 AA in ZLauncher, BibleReader+, and MyBible. It all looks maaaaahvelous!

[pruss]

The only AA fonts extant for this setup are Lubak's and those that Dr. Pruss includes with FontSmoother. You can use FontConv 1.50 to convert Windows TT and other fonts, but I've not had good results converting TT fonts.

Converting PostScript Type 1 fonts will give better quality.

There are patent issues in the U.S. with rendering TT fonts that prevent me from including full quality TT rendering in PalmFontConv.

[pruss]

Email me (arpruss at gmail dot com) if you'd like to beta test the next release to see if this helps with DateBk5 (which I don't have).

For everyone's benefit, let me say that the tests did not go well. :-(

On the bright side, I am about a third of the way to coding a solution that should work for all apps that use the same highlighting code as the PalmOS PIMs do. I do not know which apps this is: if apps use the highlighting code without any change, they should work; if they have changed it (even fairly trivially), they won't.

[jjesusfreak01]

I use Technical 18, its the same size as the system font.

[AndrewP]

I've just tried out Fonts4OS5 and FontSmoother for the first time and it's brilliant! What I particularly like is the way that it rejuvenates my older Palm III era apps by giving them trendy Trebuchet 18 AA (ok, so the icons still look a bit rubbish on my hi-res device, but hey, I can't have everything)

Most excellent.

Andrew

[pruss]

And after a lot of work, I found a way to fix the highlight issue. It's not perfect, but generally very good. It may have some side-effects under some circumstances, though.

[wellsjs]

I hope the "side-effects" aren't the same as those mentioned on all those TV aphrodisiac commercials! :eek: :D

[pruss]

I hope the "side-effects" aren't the same as those mentioned on all those TV aphrodisiac commercials! :eek: :D

The one side effect so far is that tapping on Font Collector in the Launcher in 8-bit mode caused the suitcase to turn bluish. Works fine in 16-bit mode.

Theoretically, of course: "Side-effects could include data loss, hardware damage, central nervous system disorders including frustration and explosive anger, and eye-strain."

Alex

[wellsjs]

Theoretically, of course: "Side-effects could include data loss, hardware damage, central nervous system disorders including frustration and explosive anger, and eye-strain."

AlexHhmmm . . . Viagra might be the lesser of two evils! :eek:

[jjesusfreak01]

The one side effect so far is that tapping on Font Collector in the Launcher in 8-bit mode caused the suitcase to turn bluish. Works fine in 16-bit mode.

Theoretically, of course: "Side-effects could include data loss, hardware damage, central nervous system disorders including frustration and explosive anger, and eye-strain."

Alex
The FDA is going to be after you for this, very bad...

[PCMaven]

You're welcome. I also used Comic Sans Serif 22 in Datebk5 (and most everything else) before FontSmoother. Now I use Trebuchet 17 AA which also looks great but doesn't have the wideness issue. I use Comic Sans 18 AA in almost everything else, Alethe Serif 17 AA ker in reading programs like Handstory, and Formal 18 AA in ZLauncher, BibleReader+, and MyBible. It all looks maaaaahvelous!Thanks for your ideas! I definitely like Trebuchet 18 AA for Datebk5 (I guess I like fonts slightly larger than you do) but I can't find a font to replace my original Tungsten T 22 font. Nothing seems to come close unless I've missed it somewhere...

[tanker_bob]

Thanks for your ideas! I definitely like Trebuchet 18 AA for Datebk5 (I guess I like fonts slightly larger than you do) but I can't find a font to replace my original Tungsten T 22 font. Nothing seems to come close unless I've missed it somewhere...
You're welcome! I'm no font expert, but it seems that AA fonts tend to be wider than regular fonts for the same height. After playing with all the AA fonts available, Lubak's Trebuchet comes closest to the spacing of the original system fonts. Handera is also narrow, but it looks unnaturally narrow to me. Dr. Pruss has some tightly kerneled fonts like Utopia in the FontSmoother archive that also conserve horizontal space.

Matching font sizes in vertical and horizontal dimentions is a tricky business for proportional fonts, and even more so for proportional AA fonts. The spacing around the individual letters becomes a significant issue. Even fonts of the same size number (e.g., 18) vary in actual vertical size. Even my previously favorite font, Comic Sans 22, was actually a bit shorter/smaller than the T3's native font.

That said, if you are willing to give up AA fonts to get the system font equivalency, FontCollector can tap into your system fonts and you can extract ones that you like but that aren't usually used. The T3 has a really nice Sans font embedded. For me, the beauty of AA won out.

I spent more than a few days trying out different AA fonts and sizes and tripped across Trebuchet in that process. Apart from that protracted process, I don't know what else to suggest.

[PCMaven]

Well after playing around for quite a bit I finally settled on Alethe 18 AA as the "all application" font and Trebuchet 18 AA for Datebk5. I really like the way they looked so I went ahead and registered FontSmoother! I really wish there was an equivalent AA font for the original Tungsten T22 that came with Fonts4OS5 though... ;) Then I think I'd be even happier!

[tanker_bob]

Glad you found a workable solution! It doesn't take long to get addicted to the elegance of AA fonts. ;)

[PCMaven]

Does anyone know specifically which font setting affects the Clie Organizer DateBook in the TH55? I've been playing around with Fonts4OS5 and for some reason can't find that setting.

[tanker_bob]

I'm not familiar with newer Sony apps, but some apps use their own fonts instead of the system fonts. That may be one of them. If so, there's nothing you can do short of pitching it for an app that uses the system fonts.

[lubak]

Does anyone know specifically which font setting affects the Clie Organizer DateBook in the TH55? I've been playing around with Fonts4OS5 and for some reason can't find that setting.

Try call Fonts4OS5 from CO and set Clie Small fonts.

[snakecitygirl]

As I always say, i'm not a programmer, but aren't hacks all about accessing special system functions. With hack access from YAHM, it would allow access to all the cool functions, opening the door for Zodiac specific hacks. It wouldnt be too long before a hack would be out to bypass the signing procedure. Oops, I shouldn't have said that.

By the way, everyone should buy FontSmoother, its the best.

Some AvantGo pics, You get to guess which is using FontSmoother.
I don't know ... guess the FontSmoother is for younger eyes cause at 57 I couldn't see ANY difference between these 2 when I blew up the thumbnails. Been using Fonts4OS5 for over a year on my Tungsten E & the last update I saw about FontSmoother but I just don't see the need.

[pruss]

I don't know ... guess the FontSmoother is for younger eyes cause at 57 I couldn't see ANY difference between these 2 when I blew up the thumbnails. Been using Fonts4OS5 for over a year on my Tungsten E & the last update I saw about FontSmoother but I just don't see the need.

People's preferences go different ways. There are even people who dislike antialiasing because they like the higher contrast of aliased fonts. How useful it is may also depend on screen size. For instance, the Treo 650 has such a small screen that it might not make a big difference.

Personally, I find antialiased fonts smoother. I'd prefer something like cleartype, but that would require some more Windows programming to get the font generator to do that, and I am no good at Windows programming.

Alex

[pruss]

I'm not familiar with newer Sony apps, but some apps use their own fonts instead of the system fonts. That may be one of them. If so, there's nothing you can do short of pitching it for an app that uses the system fonts.

Actually, there IS something one can do, but it's not easy, and it assumes that the app has licensing that allows modifications. You need to copy the app to the PC, let's say to "app.prc". Then take a Mobipocket-style FontSmoother font package for the aa font you want. Then find out the resource number of the nfnt font resource you want to replace (e.g., use PRCExplorer). A Mobipocket-style FS font package contains a .pdb and a .pdb-resources.prc file. The .pdb file contains one record per font in Mobipocket-style packages. Extract that record (e.g., using par, http://www.djw.org/product/palm/par, just run

par x fontdatabase.pdb

) from the .pdb file. Replace the nfnt resource in app.prc with the datafile that par found within fontdatabased.pdb. E.g.,

copy 000.0.0.pdr nfnt01a3.bin
par a app.prc nfnt01a3.bin

Now hotsync app.prc and fontdatabase.pdb-resources.prc. And, presto, the app will use the antialiased font.

If the app has an NFNT resource instead of an nfnt one, use a FontHack-style FontSmoother font package.

[PCMaven]

I've been using Font Smoother for the past few days (even registered it) but today for the first time my Appshelf screen got completely corrupted video when using Lubak's Trebuchet AA and Comic Sans 18 AA fonts. They were working fine before. Of course this happened while at work (still there) so I can't play with it enough to troubleshoot at this point but I'm just wondering if anyone has any preliminary ideas? For now I have FontSmoother loaded but I'm using Aliased fonts.

[pruss]

I've been using Font Smoother for the past few days (even registered it) but today for the first time my Appshelf screen got completely corrupted video when using Lubak's Trebuchet AA and Comic Sans 18 AA fonts. They were working fine before. Of course this happened while at work (still there) so I can't play with it enough to troubleshoot at this point but I'm just wondering if anyone has any preliminary ideas? For now I have FontSmoother loaded but I'm using Aliased fonts.

I expect 1.10 to be generally a bit more stable than 1.01. So if you email me (arpruss at gmail dot com) I'll send you my 1.09 beta. There were a few bugs in 1.01. Off-hand, I don't think they should corrupt anything on screen (though they might cause a reset under some circumstances), but who knows? Also, weird things happen with any palm app in low memory situations. Do you have a low memory situation? (Either dynamic heap or storage?)

[PCMaven]

Thanks for the beta, Alex! It didn't help the problem though...How would I check the dynamic heap memory?

[pruss]

Here's a puzzle. Sales trailed off to about three or four a day (still, much better than my other software), and then suddenly today I've got so far 29 sales since midnight PST. It's quite mysterious. Records show that the spike started late last night. What made FontSmoother suddenly so much more popular?

[na2rboy]

Here's a puzzle. Sales trailed off to about three or four a day (still, much better than my other software), and then suddenly today I've got so far 29 sales since midnight PST. It's quite mysterious. Records show that the spike started late last night. What made FontSmoother suddenly so much more popular?

Woot for you! Palmsource has FontSmoother at the top of their weekly specials e-mail!

[tanker_bob]

Woot for you! Palmsource has FontSmoother at the top of their weekly specials e-mail!
Hey Alex, who'd ya have to kill to get that billing? ;)

[pruss]

Hey Alex, who'd ya have to kill to get that billing? ;)

I guess somebody there liked the program. And they did a really good job designing the ad graphics. :-) The only problem is that the way the specials email got formatted, a number of users never saw the link to download the trial version, so the only thing they ended up getting is the registration file, and I had to point them to the trial version. To make things worse, these users apparently didn't see that you need a hi-res OS 5 device, and so palmgear is going to have to deal with some refunds from Treo 600 and OS 4 users.

I could fairly easily make the program work on the Treo 600. I am not sure that antialiased lo-res fonts would look very good, though, and the Treo 600 market is fairly small. There are also I guess the low end Zires, though.

[tanker_bob]

You'd still have to deal with the older devices, of which there are a large number still in circulation.

[pruss]

You'd still have to deal with the older devices, of which there are a large number still in circulation.

Yeah. As a temporary work-around, I changed the name to "FontSmoother for OS 5 hi-res". Hope that will stop some people from buying it who shouldn't be buying it.

Alex