[Bug 2000551] Re: [System Fonts] Replace default sinhala font from LKLUG to Noto

Thu Jan 5 12:34:17 UTC 2023

Thank you for the updates! It looks like you responded appropriately to
all of my points, but I'd like to clarify one thing about version
numbers and Kinetic.

> If a user with an updated jammy (including this fix) upgrades to
kinetic, they will still have version 0.219.1 of the language-selector-*
packages, since the version string in kinetic is lower. So no
regression.

If you're not intending to fix Kinetic, then we'll need to use a
different package version for Jammy. We generally avoid the version
situation you describe, since that makes it difficult to reliably issue
an update for users for the package in Kinetic. Consider if a security
update were then required, for example. It would be possible to fix, but
only if someone were to notice the unusual situation first. And it's
confusing for Kinetic users to be on a different package version
depending on whether or not they upgraded from Jammy or not. That
situation means there are more combinations of interactions with other
packages that might lead to different behaviours and different bugs. So
we avoid it.

Using a "compliant" version for the Jammy SRU, the original point about
regressions on upgrade still stands, but see
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/StableReleaseUpdates#Newer_Releases for
instructions and policy for this situation. It may still acceptable if
you insist on not updating Kinetic. But we will want to adjust the
version string for Jammy.

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/2000551

Title:
  [System Fonts] Replace default sinhala font from LKLUG to Noto

Status in language-selector package in Ubuntu:
  Fix Released
Status in ubuntu-meta package in Ubuntu:
  Won't Fix
Status in language-selector source package in Jammy:
  In Progress
Status in language-selector source package in Kinetic:
  Won't Fix

Bug description:
  [ Impact ]

  The current default font for Sinhala (LKLUG) is unmaintained and comes
  with issues. Noto offers Sinhala fonts with significantly higher
  quality.

  fonts-lklug-sinhala is pulled by quite a few meta packages. Instead of
  changing that, the proposed change makes fontconfig give Noto Sans
  Sinhala respective Noto Serif Sinhala higher precedence than LKLUG,
  and that — together with installation of fonts-noto-core — seems to be
  sufficient to achieve the desired result.

  [ Test Plan ]

  * Install language-selector-[common,gnome] from jammy-proposed.

  * Open Language Support and install the Sinhala language.

  * Open a terminal window and run this command:

    fc-match -a | grep -E 'LKLUG|Sinhala'

  * Confirm that Noto Sans Sinhala is listed before LKLUG.

  * Close Firefox and re-open it.

  * Visit e.g. https://si.wikipedia.org and confirm the
    improvement. (Also I (Gunnar), who don't speak Sinhala,
    notice a remarkable difference.)

  [ Where problems could occur ]

  No real problem in sight. Some Sinhala speaking users with fonts-noto-
  core installed will indeed see a surprise change when it starts to
  render Sinhala via Noto fonts instead of LKLUG. But that surprise
  ought to make them happy. :)

  Please note Robie Basak's warning about the changed font metrics in
  comment #7, though.

  [ Original description ]

  **What's the problem?**

  Currently ubuntu comes with LKLUG font for sinhala (si). it's not
  clear. e.g. we cannot recognize vowel signs and read websites using
  that font. We can change it manually but such changes do not apply to
  some applications or application types e.g. snap apps etc.

  LKLUG (last active: 2012) no one maintain it now.
  https://web.archive.org/web/20220000000000*/http://www.lug.lk/
  http://www.lug.lk/fonts/lklug

  **What expected to happen?**

  We would like to see Noto serif sinhala as the default font for sinhala language
  https://fonts.google.com/noto/specimen/Noto+Serif+Sinhala
  [Highlighs: clear (readable), thin, takes less space than sans sinhala]

  If noto sans is more suitable for ubuntuOS, you can add noto sans sinhala https://fonts.google.com/noto/specimen/Noto+Sans+Sinhala
  [Highlighs: clear (readable), thick, takes more space than serif sinhala]

  **Additional details**

  Screenshots (see the difference: LKLUG/Noto)

  LKLUG
  https://i.ibb.co/nbHM5Mw/lklug.jpg

  Noto Sinhala
  https://i.ibb.co/k9dbtYb/noto.jpg

  If you need more examples or clarifications, please add a comment

  Random posts
  1. https://groups.google.com/g/Sinhala-Unicode/c/LYxuJ44dY3g
  2. https://twitter.com/thilinag/status/1598707165920825344#m (LKLUG bug with some apps)
  3. https://www.reddit.com/r/srilanka/comments/nzpl9p/change_sinhala_font_in_ubuntu/

  Also, some developers already have designed tools, scripts for that problem however many people do not try to find these scripts and switch to other OS
  1. https://github.com/IMS94/UbuntuSinhalaFont (developer: PMC chair @apache)
  2. https://gist.github.com/thilinag/66577033fafd00c3dfdaa898c2478c79
  3. https://github.com/hankyoTutorials/linux-system-sinhala-font-changer

  Please review details, screenshots and posts. This is not a personal
  opinion and atleast, i expect to see this change in the next interim
  or LTS release.

  Furthermore, please let me know if i can help to speed-up this
  replacement process

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