The Ubuntu Font Family are a set of matching new libre/open fonts. The development is being funded by Canonical on behalf the wider Free Software community and the Ubuntu project. The technical font design work and implementation is being undertaken by Dalton Maag.
Both the final font Truetype/OpenType files and the design files used to produce the font family are distributed under an open licence and you are expressly encouraged to experiment, modify, share and improve. The typeface is sans-serif, uses OpenType features and is manually hinted for clarity on desktop and mobile computing screens.
The scope of the Ubuntu Font Family includes all the languages used by the various Ubuntu users around the world in tune with Ubuntu's philosophy which states that every user should be able to use their software in the language of their choice. So the Ubuntu Font Family project will be extended to cover many more written languages.
Facts and figures
The Ubuntu Font Family is a sans-serif typeface family with an intended coverage of thirteen fonts.
Coverage
1,200 glyphs, 200-250 languages (native languages of 3 billion people!).
Technology.
- OpenType-based TTF (TrueType)
- Alternative glyphs (e.g. proportional/non-proportional/superscript/subscript numerals)
- Debugging glyphs (U+EFFD, U+EFFE, U+EFFF, U+F000) giving face, version, grayscale level and pixels-per-em digit display)
The pixels-per-em 7-segment digits are driven by the hint engine (substituted from the Deja fonts), so if hinting is by default off (e.g. Firefox) then the output will show as a pair of '88' numerals.
Design
The four Latin characters, 'n o H O' helped to define a guide for around 80-percent of the remaining characters. Extensive manual hinting has been performed for rendered sizes below 60 pixels-per-em.
Software used:
- Fontlab Studio
- Microsoft Visual Truetype (VTT)
- In-house Python-based accent placement scripts
Ubuntu Light
ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
Ubuntu Light Italic
ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
Ubuntu Regular
ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
Ubuntu Regular Italic
ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
Ubuntu Medium
ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
Ubuntu Medium Italic
ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
Ubuntu Bold
ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
Ubuntu Bold Italic
ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
Latin
ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
Greek
ΑΒΓΔΕΖΗΘΙΚΛΜΝΞΟΠΡΣΤΥΦΧΨΩ
αβγδεζηθικλμνξοπρστυφχψω
Cyrillic
АБВГДЕЁЖЗИЙКЛМНОПРСТУФХЦЧ
абвгдеёжзийклмнопрстуфхцч
Ubuntu Condensed
ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
Ubuntu Mono Regular
ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
Ubuntu Mono Regular Italic
ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
Ubuntu Mono Bold
ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
Ubuntu Mono Bold Italic
ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
Howto.
On 2010-09-28, the libre-licensed version of the ttf-ubuntu-font-family package was added to the seed lists and the meta packages for the Ubuntu 10.10 release candidate. If you are running, testing, or installing "maverick" the package will already be on your machine, if not, run "update-manager" to install it. No themes currently use the font as default, yet.
As of 2010-08-20 the font is still in a phased beta, if you are a member of the many Launchpad groups with access (eg. ubuntu-members), you should be able to:
- Visit https://launchpad.net/people/+me/+archivesubscriptions
- Click View next to ubuntu-font-beta-testing
- Add the personalised archive details to your machine's /etc/apt/sources.list
- sudo apt-get update
- sudo apt-get install ttf-ubuntu-font-family
If you are not yet a member of any team, but have an interest in typography (and a genuine willingness to provide feedback during development) or you are working on marketing or screenshot materials, please first:
- Go to the ubuntu-typeface-interest team in Launchpad
- Click Join the team on the right-hand side
This allows a wider-range of people gain access to the font family packages without risk of disrupting the work of existing Launchpad teams focused on other topics (eg. Accessibility/Kubuntu) or affecting their quorum by stacking the teams with memberships purely to gain development access to the font family.
Please do not try to download just the .deb or .tar.gz on its own; the test fonts change weekly (normally on a Monday) and having old copies of broken/superceded versions is producing incorrect bug reports. Even worse documents are ending up with the out-of-date fonts embedded in them. Changes of glyph metrics during the beta test will later cause documents to reflow unexpectedly if they've changed! So, please stick to the personalised PPA!).
(BTW, this process is only for the testing phase! Life will be much easier after release and things have settled down). If you are seening verification errors from the package archive, run the following to import the PPA-specific signing key:
- sudo apt-key adv --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com --recv-keys 42F834EC
The download and installation instructions are available from font.ubuntu.com.
Howto
On 2010-09-28, the libre-licensed version of the ttf-ubuntu-font-family package was added to the seed lists and the meta packages for the Ubuntu 10.10 release candidate. If you are running, testing, or installing "maverick" the package will already be on your machine, if not, run "update-manager" to install it. No themes currently use the font as default, yet.
As of 2010-08-20 the font is still in a phased beta, if you are a member of the many Launchpad groups with access (eg. ubuntu-members), you should be able to:
- Visit https://launchpad.net/people/+me/+archivesubscriptions
- Click View next to ubuntu-font-beta-testing
- Add the personalised archive details to your machine's /etc/apt/sources.list
- sudo apt-get update
- sudo apt-get install ttf-ubuntu-font-family
If you are not yet a member of any team, but have an interest in typography (and a genuine willingness to provide feedback during development) or you are working on marketing or screenshot materials, please first:
- Go to the ubuntu-typeface-interest team in Launchpad
- Click Join the team on the right-hand side
This allows a wider-range of people gain access to the font family packages without risk of disrupting the work of existing Launchpad teams focused on other topics (eg. Accessibility/Kubuntu) or affecting their quorum by stacking the teams with memberships purely to gain development access to the font family.
Please do not try to download just the .deb or .tar.gz on its own; the test fonts change weekly (normally on a Monday) and having old copies of broken/superceded versions is producing incorrect bug reports. Even worse documents are ending up with the out-of-date fonts embedded in them. Changes of glyph metrics during the beta test will later cause documents to reflow unexpectedly if they've changed! So, please stick to the personalised PPA!).
(BTW, this process is only for the testing phase! Life will be much easier after release and things have settled down). If you are seening verification errors from the package archive, run the following to import the PPA-specific signing key:
- sudo apt-key adv --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com --recv-keys 42F834EC
The download and installation instructions are available from font.ubuntu.com.
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