How To Install Droid Fonts on Ubuntu 9.04 “Jaunty”

UPDATE: This post has been updated to include instructions for Ubuntu 9.10 “Karmic”, 9.04 “Jaunty” and 8.10 “Intrepid”

Based on this recent post regarding Getting Android’s Fonts on Ubuntu by Stefano Forenza I have installed these new fonts on my machine(s) and I’m enjoying them very much. I thought I’d pass on the instructions for how to install ttf-droid, the Android fonts, on your Ubuntu machine.

As you may have read in his post (linked above), the fonts are only available in the official repositories for Ubuntu 9.04 “Jaunty” and beyond. If you are using a previous version you’ll have to install them manually. Here is how we’ll do it:

Ubuntu 9.10 “Karmic”

sudo aptitude install ttf-droid

Ubuntu 9.04 “Jaunty”

sudo aptitude install ttf-droid

Ubuntu 8.10 “Intrepid”

Download ttf-droid package

Double-click downloaded file to install

OR

dpkg -i ~/Desktop/ttf-droid*.deb

I think these fonts look really clean and crisp. The ttf-droid fonts have now replaced the Red Hat Liberation fonts I was previously using on both of my work machines.

I’m curious what other fonts people generally use. I’ve run into people that are absolutely passionate about using the right font, while at the same time others don’t really care and have never changed them from their defaults. Which type are you?

11 thoughts on “How To Install Droid Fonts on Ubuntu 9.04 “Jaunty””

Ste 2009/03/13

The font named Segoe is better for both the desktop and as the default sans for all web pages.

yosch 2009/03/13

In the upstream Debian font team we run a regular review of all fonts in the archive to generate thumbnails and extract the description metadata: http://pkg-fonts.alioth.debian.org/review/

A good place to look for quality open fonts.

There’s also the Unifont.org fontguide:
http://unifont.org/fontguide/ and the OpenFontLibrary: http://www.openfontlibrary.org

Jarko 2009/03/13

I have used these fonts on my desktop with dust theme for some time now..and I have to say they’re pretty beautiful together 🙂

Screenshot:
http://kuvaton.com/k/8Uc.png

Filippo 2009/03/13

I believe DejaVu Sans Condensed with subpixel hinting has no rivals for everyday desktop use

Millikan 2010/01/09

Thanks for that tip. I just switched from Liberation to DejaVu following your suggestion and you're so correct. Wonderful. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

jldugger 2009/03/13

Can anyone tell me what license the font is released under? The package says Apache but I recall reading that it was uncertain whether the license applied the font somehow.

Emilio 2009/03/14

I use this fonts since they have been released. They look sharper than Liberation and much modern than Vera… I think they should be the default on Ubuntu.