Modifying / Replacing Fonts?

[ohadios]

Hi Guys,

I am hoping someone can point me in the right direction.
I am interested in getting Hebrew working on my Pre.
I realize that only replacing the fonts will not suffice since Hebrew requires a right-to-left engine as well (which I hope someone will port from Linux at some point).
Until then - How can I modify or replace the fonts on my rooted device so that I can at least see the right characters instead of (very nice, yet still-) square blocks?

I will appreciate any assistance.

Thanks!

[shloime]

Originally Posted by ohadios

Hi Guys,

I am hoping someone can point me in the right direction.
I am interested in getting Hebrew working on my Pre.
I realize that only replacing the fonts will not suffice since Hebrew requires a right-to-left engine as well (which I hope someone will port from Linux at some point).
Until then - How can I modify or replace the fonts on my rooted device so that I can at least see the right characters instead of (very nice, yet still-) square blocks?

I will appreciate any assistance.

Thanks!

i have been searching the whole world for an answer to your question.
it seems that you and me are the only ones on the net that cares for hebrew fonts on the pre

[WAMS]

that sucks

[jwsh]

Actually, the Pre already has RTL support, it's just none of the fonts in the browser have hebrew characters (though there are fonts on the device that have them). Input is another matter, though the on-screen keyboard should provide the solution to that shortly.

Anyway, if you don't mind losing some CJK support, you can simply overwrite one of the following font files on your device with one that has Hebrew characters:

VL-PGothic-Regular.ttf (Japanese)
uming.ttc (Chinese)
batang.ttf (Korean)

If you are familiar with Linux, this is easy to do. Everything you need is on the device already. The fonts are in /usr/share/fonts - I replaced batang.ttf with frefont/FreeSans.ttf and it worked like a charm (after a reboot). If you prefer another hebrew font, any TrueType font should work just fine. Palm updates will likely overwrite the changes (1.1.0 did), so you'll probably need to redo it after every update until palm decides to add official support.

Alternatively you could build your webcore from source (see opensource.palm.com) and modify PGFallbackFonts::init() to register more fonts, but I'll leave that exercise to the reader.

Finally, I'd suggest that everyone interested complain (politely) on palm's support board:
webOS Software - Palm Support Community

[PapaDocta]

i couldn't overwrite the file.. i keep getting cannot remove '/usr/share/fonts/batang.ttf': Read-only file system ...

how to do it?

ok i got it and copied it.. but still it won't show unicode characters! can you post the font file you are using? i just want to be able to read and don't care about writing now

[chabsin]

Assuming you've already previously rooted your Pre, you can do what I just did:

1. Download the file at ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/freefont/f...0060126.tar.gz
2. Extract FreeSans.ttf
3. Connect your PRE as USB drive, and copy the FreeSans.ttf to the 'downloads' folder
4. Root your pre: enable developer mode, then from your Windows command prompt, type 'Novacom -t open tty://'
5. 'mount -o remount,rw /' to enter read/write mode
6. 'cp /usr/share/fonts/batang.ttf /media/internal/downloads' to backup the original batang.ttf
7. 'cp /media/internal/downloads/FreeSans.ttf /usr/share/fonts/batang.ttf' to Overwrite the preinstalled batang.ttf with FreeSans.ttf (if prompted whether to overwrite batang.ttf, answer 'y')
8. 'mount -o remount,ro /' to go back to read only
9. Reboot your phone (you may want to exit Develepor Mode first). Congratulations, you can now read Hebrew

Try at your own risk. I know nothing about Linux -- just browsed a bit and figured out how to follow jwsh's instructions.

Shalom!

[ericizzy1]

Originally Posted by chabsin

Assuming you've already previously rooted your Pre, you can do what I just did:

1. Download the file at ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/freefont/f...0060126.tar.gz
2. Extract FreeSans.ttf
3. Connect your PRE as USB drive, and copy the FreeSans.ttf to the 'downloads' folder
4. Root your pre: enable developer mode, then from your Windows command prompt, type 'Novacom -t open tty://'
5. 'mount -o remount,rw /' to enter read/write mode
6. 'cp /usr/share/fonts/batang.ttf /media/internal/downloads' to backup the original batang.ttf
7. 'cp /media/internal/downloads/FreeSans.ttf /usr/share/fonts/batang.ttf' to Overwrite the preinstalled batang.ttf with FreeSans.ttf (if prompted whether to overwrite batang.ttf, answer 'y')
8. 'mount -o remount,ro /' to go back to read only
9. Reboot your phone. Congratulations, you can now read Hebrew

Try at your own risk. I know nothing about Linux -- just browsed a bit and figured out how to follow jwsh's instructions.

Shalom!

just for future refarance, how do i restore to default?

[chabsin]

Start at step 4. Replace steps 6-7 with the following single command:
'cp /media/internal/downloads/batang.ttf /usr/share/fonts/batang.ttf'. reply 'y' if prompted.

To turn it back on, you'll start from step 4 and skip step 6.

[p25o1]

can we do the same to get Arabic fonts ??

can some one guide me, on were can i get them.

thx

[amjz]

jwsh i followed your instructions and it works tnx.
Now my palm pre reads Hebrew, but i wonder why cant read Arabic as well?!!

also i downloaded some unicode and arabic fonts and did the instructions you mentioned but not working !!! even that Arabic fonts similar Hebrew fonts right to letf!!

is there any way or trick to make it read arabic as well?

Thanks in advance

[PapaDocta]

yep same here.. it won't read Arabic!

[amjz]

Originally Posted by jwsh

Alternatively you could build your webcore from source (see opensource.palm.com) and modify PGFallbackFonts::init() to register more fonts, but I'll leave that exercise to the reader.

Howcan i do this please?

I downloaded the webcore from opensource.palm.com and extract it but i cant find the PGFallbackFonts::init() to modify it to add mo languages!

[motiso]

Where can I get instruction on how to root my pre?
THanks

[motiso]

OK I succeeded to install the hebrew fonts!!! I am so happy now

Now there is only one problem...on screen Hebrew keyboard..
Does anyone know regarding Hebrew virtual keyboard?

[ladyTarzan]

hello everyone,
after i learned how to root my Pre, i did what ericizzy1 suggested and my PalmPre can read hebrew now..
still, it fails sometimes with emails. for example emails sent from outlook sometimes are still in gibrish (not the subject but the content of the email)
is there a fix to that also?
thank you all

[doublebear]

Thanks so much chabsin, not being able to get to Israeli websites was always the one thing that bothered me about the pre. I really appreciate your help.

[zepnik]

A much easier way is to use quickinstall and overwrite the existing fonts.

From the tools menu, choose "send file" and then put "/usr/share/fonts" as the destination.

I hope this will make things more simple.

[yondawg]

I installed freesans using the quickinstall method detailed above, but haaretz still loads as blocks.

Do I specifically need to rename the file to overwrite another font?

[pink]

I tried the easy way through WebOSQuickInstall - But after I press "send to device" - I get an ERROR message:" ERROR 1: Connection refused: connect" and then: "ERROR no device found" -
My device "IS" plugged in and visible on the computer...
Can someone guide me please?

Im totaly not a computer know how!

[pretoo]

You have to get the read/write access.
Try to run Command Line (WebOSQuickInstall --> Tools --> Linux Command Line), enter:
'mount -o remount,rw /' (w/o quotes)
and then send Your file. It should help.
Go back to read only mode (enter:
'mount -o remount,ro /' (w/o quotes).
I didn't try this method in this particular case.
I've tried this to change character table (alternate)to polish.
-pretoo-