Android Studio not correctly rendering font on Ubuntu

Question

Below is the picture of Android Studio when I first installed it:

I'm using Ubuntu 12.04 with Oracle Java 7. But the fonts are looking very ugly. They are not looking like they look when I see them on eclipse.

Earlier when I installed NetBeans, I had same problem too.

Answer 1

I've tried several suggested tweaks, tried using FontFix Patched JDK, FontForge, and editing studio.vmoptions; though some of these could show some improvement, it does not come close to the font rendering quality of the non-swing apps like eclipse.

I've found this to be the easiest and cleanest solution:

rm -r ~/.AndroidStudioBeta

If you have installed openjdk-fontfix, or made changes to studio.vmoptions, it is better you revert back those changes to their defaults.

 sudo add-apt-repository ppa:no1wantdthisname/openjdk-fontfix
 sudo apt-get update
 sudo apt-get install ppa-purge
 sudo ppa-purge ppa:no1wantdthisname/openjdk-fontfix

Remove all custom-added JAVA environment variables ($JAVA_HOME, $PATH:$HOME/bin:$JAVA_HOME/bin). Check in files, /etc/profile, ~/.profile, ~/.pam_environment

Install the latest Oracle Java via launchpad ppa

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:webupd8team/java
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install oracle-java8-installer

This ppa installer will usually do more than what a manual JDK configuration will do.

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Monospaced fonts like 'Inconsolata' and 'Source Code Pro' works best for me.

Answer 2

Android Studio 1.2 Preview 1 has been released a few hours ago (Mar 9th 2015): http://tools.android.com/recent/androidstudio12preview1

It also includes several really important fixes that have been requested by Android Studio users, such as high density (retina) support for Windows and Linux.

It is based on IntelliJ IDEA 14.1, and according to the IntelliJ release notes, includes "The HiDPI support for Windows/Linux (scaled icons/font-size, no blur)".

However, I tried this on my machine (Ubuntu 14.10), and could not see any improvements. Maybe someone else has information on how to make it work?

Answer 3

In studio.sh, find this line at the bottom of the file:

eval "$JDK/bin/java" $ALL_JVM_ARGS -Dawt.useSystemAAFontSettings=lcd -Djb.restart.code=88 $MAIN_CLASS_NAME "$@"

and change it to

eval "$JDK/bin/java" $ALL_JVM_ARGS -Dawt.useSystemAAFontSettings=on -Djb.restart.code=88 $MAIN_CLASS_NAME "$@"

This means changing the parameter

-Dawt.useSystemAAFontSettings=lcd (if present)

to

-Dawt.useSystemAAFontSettings=on

Or simply add this param if you don't have it.

Answer 4

There actually is a solution. You need to install JDK font fix as follows:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:no1wantdthisname/openjdk-fontfix
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install openjdk-7-jdk

Then, open studio.vmoptions and optionally studio64.vmoptions in your android-studio/bin directory, and add following lines to both of them (the first one might be already there):

-Dawt.useSystemAAFontSettings=on
-Dswing.aatext=true
-Dswing.defaultlaf=com.sun.java.swing.plaf.gtk.GTKLookAndFeel

After you reboot, the font rendering is just fine. To get the most Eclipse-like experience, go to File, Settings, Editor, Colors & Fonts, Font. Save the current scheme as a new one, and change the font to "Monospaced" with size of 14.

Answer 5

You do not need to install OpenJDK or the above-mentioned fix .deb for correct font rendering. Simply launch the Studio with:

_JAVA_OPTIONS='-Dawt.useSystemAAFontSettings=lcd -Dsun.java2d.xrender=true' path/to/studio.sh

.. and fonts should render right under Ubuntu with Oracle's JDK 7. Looks even better when you change theme to GTK+ under File -> Settings -> Appearance.

Answer 6

What you should do is configure the fonts in the settings as follows: File > Settings > Editor > Colors & Fonts > Font

In that screen then you save a new scheme clicking in Save as, and putting a name on it, lets say "Custom".

Then below you'll find all the settings you need, you can tweak the font family and the size as well.