Firefox in Ubuntu 12.04 stops recognize Helvetica and others fonts

Question

Sunddely Firefox stops recognize TTF. All text assigned to special fonts as Helvetica is now presented with Arial or other plain font..

The last changes registered in log of updates was on 03 May. I dont know what's happening. Someone knows it?

012-05-03 15:08:38 upgrade firefox-globalmenu 11.0+build1-0ubuntu4 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1
012-05-03 15:08:38 status half-configured firefox-globalmenu 11.0+build1-0ubuntu4
012-05-03 15:08:39 status unpacked firefox-globalmenu 11.0+build1-0ubuntu4
012-05-03 15:08:39 status half-installed firefox-globalmenu 11.0+build1-0ubuntu4
012-05-03 15:08:39 status half-installed firefox-globalmenu 11.0+build1-0ubuntu4
012-05-03 15:08:39 status unpacked firefox-globalmenu 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1
012-05-03 15:08:39 status unpacked firefox-globalmenu 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1
012-05-03 15:08:39 upgrade firefox 11.0+build1-0ubuntu4 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1
012-05-03 15:08:39 status half-configured firefox 11.0+build1-0ubuntu4
012-05-03 15:08:39 status unpacked firefox 11.0+build1-0ubuntu4
012-05-03 15:08:39 status half-installed firefox 11.0+build1-0ubuntu4
012-05-03 15:08:41 status half-installed firefox 11.0+build1-0ubuntu4
012-05-03 15:08:41 status half-installed firefox 11.0+build1-0ubuntu4
012-05-03 15:08:41 status half-installed firefox 11.0+build1-0ubuntu4
012-05-03 15:08:42 status half-installed firefox 11.0+build1-0ubuntu4
012-05-03 15:08:42 status half-installed firefox 11.0+build1-0ubuntu4
012-05-03 15:08:42 status unpacked firefox 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1
012-05-03 15:08:42 status unpacked firefox 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1
012-05-03 15:08:42 upgrade firefox-gnome-support 11.0+build1-0ubuntu4 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1
012-05-03 15:08:42 status half-configured firefox-gnome-support 11.0+build1-0ubuntu4
012-05-03 15:08:42 status unpacked firefox-gnome-support 11.0+build1-0ubuntu4
012-05-03 15:08:42 status half-installed firefox-gnome-support 11.0+build1-0ubuntu4
012-05-03 15:08:42 status half-installed firefox-gnome-support 11.0+build1-0ubuntu4
012-05-03 15:08:43 status unpacked firefox-gnome-support 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1
012-05-03 15:08:43 status unpacked firefox-gnome-support 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1
012-05-03 15:09:20 configure firefox 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1 <none>
012-05-03 15:09:20 status unpacked firefox 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1
012-05-03 15:09:20 status unpacked firefox 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1
012-05-03 15:09:20 status unpacked firefox 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1
012-05-03 15:09:21 status unpacked firefox 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1
012-05-03 15:09:21 status unpacked firefox 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1
012-05-03 15:09:21 status half-configured firefox 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1
012-05-03 15:09:21 status installed firefox 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1
012-05-03 15:09:21 configure firefox-globalmenu 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1 <none>
012-05-03 15:09:21 status unpacked firefox-globalmenu 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1
012-05-03 15:09:21 status half-configured firefox-globalmenu 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1
012-05-03 15:09:21 status installed firefox-globalmenu 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1
012-05-03 15:09:21 configure firefox-gnome-support 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1 <none>
012-05-03 15:09:21 status unpacked firefox-gnome-support 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1
012-05-03 15:09:21 status half-configured firefox-gnome-support 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1
012-05-03 15:09:21 status installed firefox-gnome-support 12.0+build1-0ubuntu0.12.04.1

Twitter's screenshot: before presented with Helvetica, now with ugly Arial font.

score 4 · Answer 1 · answered Nov 21 '12 at 17:26

I was recently debugging a font issue and found the FC_DEBUG environment variable to be useful. You can run firefox from the command prompt with

FC_DEBUG=1 firefox > debug.out

Let firefox startup and then quit it. The debug.out file will list the fonts and it looed for and what it found.

You might also find the command fc-match to be useful. You can type

fc-match helvetica

to see which font it will use. Perhaps this will give you a hint about what is going wrong.

score 0 · Answer 2 · edited Jan 27 '18 at 13:19

I changed $HOME/.config/fontconfig/fonts.conf and associated sans serif font to Ubuntu regular font, just like that:

<fontconfig>
<match>
  <test name="family">
       <string>sans-serif</string>
  </test>
  <edit name="family" mode="prepend">
       <string>Ubuntu</string>
  </edit>
</match>

So now when I type fc-match helvetica I get this:

$ fc-match helvetica
Ubuntu-R.ttf: "Ubuntu" "Regular"

Well, it's just a workaround, but it's enough to me. Thanks anyway, Gary!

Firefox in Ubuntu 12.04 stops recognize Helvetica and others fonts

2 Answers2