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4.1.63.1 x11_fonts

Upon initial startup, the default font is taken from the X11 resources as set in the system or user .Xdefaults file or on the command line.

Example:

           gnuplot*font: lucidasans-bold-12

A new default font may be specified to the x11 driver from inside gnuplot using

          `set term x11 font "<fontspec>"`

The driver first queries the X-server for a font of the exact name given. If this query fails, then it tries to interpret <fontspec> as "<font>,<size>,<slant>,<weight>" and to construct a full X11 font name of the form

           -*-<font>-<weight>-<s>-*-*-<size>-*-*-*-*-*-<encoding>
     
      <font> is the base name of the font (e.g. Times or Symbol)
      <size> is the point size (defaults to 12 if not specified)
      <s> is `i` if <slant>=="italic" `o` if <slant>=="oblique" `r` otherwise
      <weight> is `medium` or `bold` if explicitly requested, otherwise `*`
      <encoding> is set based on the current character set (see encoding).

So `set term x11 font "arial,15,italic"` will be translated to -*-arial-*-i-*-*-15-*-*-*-*-*-iso8859-1 (assuming default encoding). The <size>, <slant>, and <weight> specifications are all optional. If you do not specify <slant> or <weight> then you will get whatever font variant the font server offers first. You may set a default enconding via the corresponding X11 resource. E.g.

           gnuplot*encoding: iso8859-15

The driver also recognizes some common PostScript font names and replaces them with possible X11 or TrueType equivalents. This same sequence is used to process font requests from `set label`.

If your gnuplot was built with configuration option –enable-x11-mbfonts, you can specify multi-byte fonts by using the prefix "mbfont:" on the font name. An additional font may be given, separated by a semicolon. Since multi-byte font encodings are interpreted according to the locale setting, you must make sure that the environmental variable LC_CTYPE is set to some appropriate locale value such as ja_JP.eucJP, ko_KR.EUC, or zh_CN.EUC.

Example:

           set term x11 font 'mbfont:kana14;k14'
                 # 'kana14' and 'k14' are Japanese X11 font aliases, and ';'
                 # is the separator of font names.
           set term x11 font 'mbfont:fixed,16,r,medium'
                 # <font>,<size>,<slant>,<weight> form is also usable.
           set title '(mb strings)' font 'mbfont:*-fixed-medium-r-normal--14-*'
     

The same syntax applies to the default font in Xresources settings, for example,

           gnuplot*font: \\
               mbfont:-misc-fixed-medium-r-normal--14-*-*-*-c-*-jisx0208.1983-0
     

If gnuplot is built with –enable-x11-mbfonts, you can use two special PostScript font names 'Ryumin-Light-*' and 'GothicBBB-Medium-*' (standard Japanese PS fonts) without the prefix "mbfont:".