Fedora usually provides latest version of softwares with their new features. I really like the fact that I usually should not download latest softwares manually to use their new features. But one exception in this area was TexLive. Currently, the latest version of TexLive in Fedora repositories is TexLive 2007. Fortunately, TexLive 2009 is coming to Fedora (TexLive Fedora Feature) and I’m really interested in that specially that it’ll bring XePersian to Fedora. It’ll allow us to create Persian documents with Tex and it was introduced in TexLive 2008. I was so interested that I added its experimental repository and installed it on my Laptop. Finally, I managed to compile and view some XePersian sample files! 🙂
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As far as I know, currently the only Fedora font which completely supports Persian is DejaVu. There are some Arabic fonts but they do not support Persian completely, and so they are unusable for Persian users. They are many beautiful Persian fonts, which every Persian user will need to have on his system. Considering the availability of XePersian in Fedora, the need for nice Persian fonts are even more serious.
Well, I decided to expand my Fedora involvement by packaging some Persian fonts for Fedora (after that I’ll probably jump into Yum world, which is currently “broken by design” in many aspects for every desktop user except people with a fast, always available internet connection! but that’ll need some free time…).
The fonts that I’m currently considering are Farsiweb fonts and IRMUG’s X Series 2 fonts. If you know other nice Persian fonts with a suitable license, please let me know.
In addition to Persian, these fonts provide support for these languages:
Arabic, Azerbaijani (as written in the Arabic script), Urdu, Pashto, Dari, Uzbek, Kurdish, Uighur, old Turkish (Ottoman) and modern Turkish (Roman). X Series 2 fonts support Latin for the sake of completeness.
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If you access Internet through PPTP vpn connection, you’ll certainly like this: according to bug #517297 , Fedora 12 media (DVD and Desktop LiveCD) will contain NetworkManager PPTP plugin by default, so you don’t need to download and install NetworkManager-pptp separately in order to access Internet using Fedora 12. I was amazed how fast it happened, and I wondered why I didn’t do it sooner! 😛
Have fun! 🙂