SHOWFONT(1)

💅 SHOWFONT — the font dumper for your X font server, bestie

okay so picture this: it's a General Commands Manual page, it's SHOWFONT(1), and it's literally just here to spill all the tea about your fonts. no cap.

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✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

showfont [ -options ... ] -fn pattern

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🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

showfont shows you the data about a font that matches the pattern you gave it. and bestie, it does not hold back — the info it dumps includes font information, font properties, character metrics, and character bitmaps. the whole package. the full lore. 💖

now, about patterns: the wildcard character * matches any sequence of characters — including none at all — in the font name. and ? matches any single character. iconic duo fr fr.

⚠️ but listen: the * and ? characters must be quoted so the shell doesn't go feral and expand them before showfont ever sees them. protect them. 🫶

and if you give no pattern at all? * is just assumed. the default is chaos. we love that. 🌈

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🎀 OPTIONS 🎀

• -server servername — the X font server to contact. servername has to be specified in one of the formats defined in the Font Server Names section of X(7). if you don't specify it, the server name sitting in the FONTSERVER environment variable gets used instead. iykyk. ✨
• -fn name — the font to display. this is the main character of the whole operation, ngl.
• -lsb — request the bit order of the font as LSBFirst (least significant bit first). 💅
• -msb — request the bit order of the font as MSBFirst (most significant bit first).
• -LSB — request the byte order of the font as LSBFirst (least significant byte first). yes, it's different from -lsb, mind the caps, bestie. 👑
• -MSB — request the byte order of the font as MSBFirst (most significant byte first).
• -ext[ents_only] — only the character extents get displayed, and not the bitmaps. lowkey a glow-down in detail but a glow-up in brevity. 🌸
• -start char — the start of the range of characters to display (char is a number).
• -end char — the end of the range of characters to display (char is a number).
• -unit n — the scanline unit of the font (8, 16, 32, or 64). pick your fighter.
• -pad n — the scanpad unit of the font (8, 16, 32, or 64).
• -b[itmap_pad] n — the bitmap padding unit of the font (0, 1, or 2, where 0 is ImageRectMin, 1 is ImageRectMaxWidth and 2 is ImageRectMax). three options, three vibes. 🌈
• -noprops — do not show the font properties. sometimes you just don't wanna know. 🙈
• -version — print the program version and exit. slay and dip. 💅

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💜 SEE ALSO 💜

xfs(1), fslsfonts(1), fstobdf(1), xlsfonts(1), X(7).

the whole friend group. go say hi. 🫶

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🌟 ENVIRONMENT 🌟

• FONTSERVER — the default X font server to contact. the server name must be specified in one of the formats defined in the Font Server Names section of X(7). it's the fallback bestie when you forget -server. ✨

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👑 AUTHOR 👑

Dave Lemke, Network Computing Devices, Inc. absolute legend, we stan. 🎀

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and that's the whole page, bestie — this was X Version 11, showfont 1.0.6, and yeah, that's the vibe check, we're done here. periodt. 💖🦋✨