Microsoft's TrueType core fonts install howto

How to install additional fonts?
How to install Microsoft fonts?
How to list out all recognized and installed fonts?

Microsoft's TrueType core fonts install howto

Well, one good thing of having Microsoft as your base OS, is having their set of fonts.
Linux basically had this terrible font sets - but it has improved over the number of development years compared to the old RedHat 6.0 days. Still, there are more space for improvement. As a result of this, we are going to install Microsoft's TrueType core fonts.

One major requirement is you need to have rpmbuild installed from F7. If not, you can install them by doing so as root:

# yum -y install rpm-build rpmdevtools rpm-libs

Now proceed installing the second font-installation requirement,



# yum -y install cabextract

After successful installation, download the latest msttcorefonts spec file here. Then go to your download location, as root, do the build thing

# rpmbuild -bb msttcorefonts-2.0-1.spec

If you experience any problems like these
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
RPM build errors: Bad exit status from /var/tmp/rpm-tmp.60339 (%prep)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Try issuing the command again as root.

This will download about 9 MB (more or less) set of fonts from sourceforge mirror and repackage them for further installation as single rpm installation file. It might take some time depending on your internet download speed. So get a milk or a coffee...

After successful download, install your own newly built rpm file

# rpm -ivh /root/rpmbuild/RPMS/noarch/msttcorefonts-2.0-1.noarch.rpm

If the rpm file is not there, do

# updatedb
# locate msttcorefonts*.rpm

This would locate the just compiled rpm file for you.

After that, you can reload your XFS server

# service xfs reload

Have read that xfs restart brings out unknown flickering and dirty screen, so watch out for that. I did a reload with my own.

Now, enjoy your new and high quality MS fonts compiled from your own system. Fireup a new document from linux word processor (Office menu). You will be seeing new set of microsoft font names there along with the other default linux fonts.

Alternatively, to display and list out those fonts, try

# xlsfonts | grep 'microsoft\|monotype'

Please note that you need to restart all programs that you want to make aware of the new fonts. Note also that not all fonts have 'microsoft' in their name, some of them will be from 'monotype' instead.

Alternatively, hit Ctrl+Alt+Backspace for immediate none-liner effect.

* This way, we do not distribute Microsoft's fonts in a prohibited way to the best of my knowledge that is) and don't bypass the rpm database like other the font installation scripts does.

WARNING!!! WARNING!!! WARNING!!!

This works out just fine for me and only hereby documented for my own purpose as my own reference, as it is without due warranty it would work for you. You may try this, all howtos and install tips mentioned from these blog pages at your own risk! My current working environment is Fedora 7.

Related Post:

European Font Installation on Fedora

Three Steps to Install Microsoft TrueType Fonts in Fedora